Not representative of actual author.

Having become a father just shy of four years ago, the time I get to play games has been somewhat reduced today, compared to my responsibility-free younger years. However, I still save a few hours throughout the week for my favourite hobby, and have just recently introduced my son to the delights of Nintendo’s catalogue of games on the Wii U. Seeing his face light up as he completes a level in Super Mario 3D World reminds me of when I played a game for the first time, and the sense of wonder and joy that gaming brings.

Ah the good old days!

I still remember the day my dad bought a games system, when I was a young lad, that had tennis, squash and football built in. It might have been a Grandstand system, but I’m not 100% certain. The sense of interacting with the simplistic bat and ball on the screen was mind blowing at the time, and ever since, gaming has been an enjoyable part of my life. Many more systems took their place below our TV over the years, from the humble ZX Spectrum with its vast roster of games like Chuckie Egg 2, Jet Set Willy, and the superb Where Time Stood Still and The Great Escape; to my college years where me and my mates spent many happy days and nights playing Kick Off 2 and Sensible Soccer on the Amiga, through a haze of drunken escapades and project deadlines. When I started working I had a bit more disposable income so could afford to buy more games, as well as my first console which was the original PlayStation. Games like Metal Gear Solid and Resident Evil really broke the mould of what games could be, and created whole new genres of their own. When Sony launched the PS2, I bought the console on launch day, and that generation gave birth to the open world genre on consoles, thanks to the release of Grand Theft Auto III. Rockstar blew me away with a huge open world to explore, changing weather, and so many different things to see and do. It was around this time that I bought my first Nintendo console, the GameCube, which introduced me to Super Mario and Zelda. I was amazed by the creativity and pure fun factor that Nintendo brought to their games. Ever since buying a GameCube, I’ve always bought a Nintendo console to complement my Sony console, and for family gaming fun, Nintendo can’t be beaten.

‘Wow’ indeed.

With the arrival of my son, my gaming habits have had to change. I no longer have countless hours to spend playing epic games like Fallout 3 on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Instead, my gaming time is in the late evening, for a couple of hours if I’m lucky. I don’t get on every night, as I have TV shows and films I like to watch too, that eat into my time; but I try to get on when I can. While I work through the week, I try to play single player games, with the weekends spent playing multiplayer games like Battlefield 4 or FIFA with my mates into the wee small hours. It doesn’t work out all the time, as sometimes – like all children – my son wakes up through the night, so I’ve had to help get him back to sleep, or take him away so the missus can catch up on some shut eye. I still remember when I was playing Journey on the PS3 a couple of years back, and the wee fella woke up and wasn’t for going back to sleep, so I took him down to the living room. He saw Journey on the TV and was so enthralled by the mysterious world and the strange character with the huge scarf trailing behind him, that he turned to me with a big smile on his face and said simply ‘wow’, which sums up the game nicely!

Watch out for the licky dudes – as my son calls them

In the past year my son has shown a keen interest in gaming, mainly through the Mario series, although he has been obsessed by the Pikmin since I downloaded the Pikmin 3 demo, and subsequently the full game itself. He’s just beginning to get to grips with controlling the characters with the pad, but can negotiate some of the earlier levels in Super Mario 3D World, and make the top 5 position in Mario Kart 8 single player. He also loves the music levels in Rayman Legends, and has made me play the Castle Rock level countless times to the point where I can finish the level with the prowess of a blindfolded Jedi! While gaming has been good for him, we do try to limit his time playing games, and with tech in general. I don’t think it’s too healthy to leave your child to grow up in a purely digital world.

I was highly amused the other day there, when my son raided my Wii U game collection and removed Rayman Legends, Mario Kart 8 and Super Mario 3D World along with a few other favourite games of his. He then proceeded to line them up in his DVD collection beside the likes of Toy Story and Cars, and I don’t think it will be long before the console is claimed as well! So it looks like I have passed on the gaming torch to my son, but my own torch is still burning bright. Becoming a dad doesn’t necessarily mean the death of your gaming life, but it’s rebirth through playing with your child, and showing them the joy that gaming can bring.

Following on from Microsoft reducing the price of the Xbox One for a limited time in the UK, Sony have announced that the PlayStation 4 is getting a temporary price cut to £299 until April 28th. This deal is limited to five retailers: Argos, GAME, Tesco, Amazon and Very.

When we looked at these retailers’ websites, we noticed that they have discounted the console even further, with Amazon, Tesco and Argos offering the console for £289. GAME are also offering the console for that price, but throw in a copy of Minecraft as an extra incentive.

If you’ve yet to jump on the next gen bandwagon, these price cuts should be quite appealing. But are they enough to tempt you to move on from your Xbox 360 or PS3?

• Format: PS4 (version reviewed), Vita
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Atomicom
• Developer: Atomicom
• Players: 1 + Online Multiplayer
• Site: www.switchgalaxy.com/
• Game code provided by the publisher

Switch Galaxy Ultra puts you in the cockpit of Vince Vance, a rogue space pilot in the same vein as Star Wars icon Han Solo. Vince has a CV that takes in the position of Pigeon Fancier, Pirate and Primary School Teacher among others! His latest venture has him collecting and delivering a resource known as Tantalum for a company called the Dakur Corporation. This entails taking his spaceship along an interstellar highway to various outposts and collecting as much Tantalum as he can before trying to deliver it, all while trying not to lose any during his journey.

Switch Galaxy Ultra can pick up a fair head of steam if you put the foot down!

The game begins with a well illustrated comic strip that sets the scene for the games universe, and is obviously inspired by the battle-scarred galaxy of Star Wars with its space junk aesthetic. There is no overarching plot, with the comic simply being used to add depth to the game’s backdrop. When you get into the game itself, your ship sets off along a track with several lanes that have various obstacles thrown in your way such as multicoloured barriers, broken tracks, and other space travelers. While the game is reminiscent of the Wipeout series, the game mechanics are a lot more simplistic, with gameplay limited to acceleration, braking and changing lanes. When you get to the halfway point of the track, you are hit with a mini game, where you have to collect the Tantalum. During this stage, you have to steer your ship through a space tunnel that resembles the opening credits of Doctor Who, and try to fly through the ten pieces that are dotted throughout the level. After this is completed you are put back on the track to deliver the collected Tantalum, all while trying to avoid any collisions that will take a piece of your cargo away. The more Tantalum you collect the better; as you need it to unlock levels, and to progress through the game.

Highway maintenance isn’t at its best in Switch Galaxy Ultra, much like the UK at present!

The game contains over 50 levels, and courses get more complex with extra obstacles put in your way as you progress. You also get help with boost pads that increase your speed significantly. Coloured orbs let you travel through similarly coloured barriers, while colliding with bombs takes out whole sections of barriers and any nearby spaceships. As you progress through the game enemy ships appear that fire bombs at you (these slow you down or invert your controls). Credits are also dotted around the tracks which can be spent on buying upgrades to your ship to increase your acceleration, boost, dexterity, density and shield; or even buy a new ship altogether, which has better stats than your original one. You are timed for your endeavours through each level, but your time isn’t important, as your focus is on collecting as much Tantalum as possible to enable you to unlock the next level.

The later levels can be particularly punishing, and require a great deal of concentration if you travel as fast as you can. There’s a great deal of repetition, with the Tantalum collection mini levels in particular being pretty dull. We found ourselves racing as fast as we could during the first stage, as there is no penalty for crashing into barriers, and this enables you to go for it and enjoy rattling around the course as fast as your ship will go. Collecting the Tantalum is pretty easy, with each stage being a straight tunnel with only the positioning of the Tantalum being different from stage to stage. When it comes to delivering the Tantalum we found it quite easy to just keep applying the brakes throughout the level, and going through the stage at a snails pace. It means you can basically deliver all the Tantalum without too much of a problem, as your finish time is irrelevant.

This yellow power up lets you travel through yellow barriers without loss of speed or Tantalum.

As well as a single player campaign, Switch Galaxy Ultra also has a survival mode, where you have to get as far as you can through a randomised stage where just one collision means game over. You are judged by how far you get, and this distance is posted to an online leaderboard. Concentration is the name of the game, and you dare not blink for fear of crashing. While playing this mode, we found a few instances where we thought the collision detection was a bit off, which was quite frustrating when we were doing pretty well. The game also has an online multiplayer mode, but during our time with the game we never found anyone to play against; which was disappointing, as the game boasts cross play with Vita players.

Switch Galaxy Ultra isn’t a bad game by any means, but it’s not a very inspiring one either. While the sense of speed is tremendous when you go for it, the gameplay is quite repetitive and simplistic. The graphics are also very much from the last generation of consoles, although the soundtrack goes well with the onscreen action. With a few tweaks to the gameplay Switch Galaxy Ultra could have been a decent game, but unfortunately it’s an average one at best.

Sony have just announced a new music streaming service called PlayStation Music, that will be launched this spring in 41 markets around the world. The new service is in partnership with Spotify, and will bring the award-winning digital music service to the PlayStation 3 and 4, and Sony’s Xperia smartphone and tablet platforms; although it looks like the Vita has sadly been neglected.

The new service will allow PlayStation users to link their accounts to Spotify, and give them access to a library of over 30 million songs and 1.5 billion playlists. The great thing is that you will be able to create your own soundtrack for your gaming session, even if you’re not a Premium subscriber. So if you fancy a bit of Luther Vandross while visiting the strip club in GTA V, or some One Direction while you mow down Clickers in The Last of Us, your dreams are about to be realised. It has been confirmed via a reply to a comment on the official US PlayStation blog as well as the official EU PlayStation blog (comment 18) that both free and Premium versions of Spotify are on their way to Sony machines.

The birth of PlayStation Music signals the death knell of Music Unlimited, Sony’s own digital music subscription service. Music Unlimited will be closed in all 19 countries that it is available, on March 29th 2015. Subscribers to Music Unlimited will receive up to 30 days of free access, from February 28th until the service closes on March 29th.

2014 was disappointing for gaming on a number of levels, with several games not living up to early hype, and others getting released in a broken state. Of all the console manufacturers I would say Nintendo had the best year, with the Wii U finally producing some top notch games like Mario Kart 8, Bayonetta 2 and Super Smash Bros. Sony and Microsoft may have sold a staggering amount of new consoles, but their game output has been slow and fairly lacklustre in comparison. There were no stand out titles that were universally praised, with journalists’ reviews varying wildly, which made choosing a game more difficult.

Mario Kart 8 was one of the highlights of 2014.

It is quite a sad indictment of last year’s games that some of the top rated titles of 2014 have been remasters from the last console generation, with The Last of Us and GTA V being the best of the bunch. It seems that a lot of publishers are jumping on the bandwagon with upgraded versions of Sleeping Dogs, Metro Redux and The Master Chief Collection all hitting shelves for the new generation of consoles, with other titles planned for this year. The Master Chief Collection is also a prime example of another bugbear of 2014, the releasing of unfinished and broken games. Battlefield 4 started it off at the end of 2013 with a disastrous launch, of a game that was riddled with bugs and glitches that took the best part of a year to fix. In 2014 we’ve had the Master Chief Collection, which is having major problems with online matchmaking, with many disgruntled gamers asking for refunds. Sony have had the Driveclub fiasco, where the long delayed title suffered from server issues that stopped players from playing online, and delayed the promised PS+ version of the game indefinitely. Ubisoft have had a nightmare launch for Assassin’s Creed Unity, which has been plagued by frame rate problems and serious bugs, making the game nearly unplayable for some players.

I think you need to see a plastic surgeon love!

There were a lot of games that were hyped up last year, with Watch Dogs being hailed as a GTA killer, Destiny being touted as the revolution of the first person shooter, and The Evil Within marking the return of survival horror. Unfortunately none of these games lived up to the hype. Watch Dogs received mixed reviews, although I know a few gamers that really enjoyed it. Destiny was far from being a revolution, but was a decent shooter with a poor story and repetitive gameplay. The Evil Within was nowhere near to being a spiritual successor to Resident Evil 4. For me Destiny was my biggest disappointment of the year; while the mechanics of the game were sound, the threadbare story was disappointing, especially after experiencing games like the Mass Effect series. The bullet sponge boss battles were also uninspiring, and the recyclng of enemies and levels meant that the battles quickly became a chore, rather than a challenge. While it can be a lot of fun when you play with friends, when compared to the humorous antics of the Borderlands series it is all rather dull and lifeless.

While it has been a disappointing year, there have been a few titles that I have really enjoyed. The new Wolfenstein was a great game, that was a nice amalgamation of the old style shooters with the new. It was good to go back to a World War setting, which has been neglected recently in favour of the modern day and futuristic themes. I also really enjoyed the new Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, which really benefited from a three year development cycle. The single player was a lot of fun, with plenty of blockbuster bombast and a decent variety to the levels, although some of the set pieces had a feeling of Deja Vu about them. The addition of the Exo-suit to the multiplayer was inspired though, and added extra verticality and unpredictability with a decent selection of well designed maps rounding out the package.

Shovel Knight was one of many indie games that brightened up the year.

With the majority of big budget games disappointing in one capacity or another during 2014, the resurgence of indie games showed that creativity isn’t dead in gaming, with several outstanding releases including OlliOlli, Transistor, Towerfall Ascension and Shovel Knight. I also really enjoyed Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition, with its stunning art style, inventive combos, and platforming. With games like No Man’s Sky looking like raising the bar for indie games next year, and big budget titles like the new Zelda, The Division, Uncharted 4 and Star Wars: Battlefront showing promise, I have high hopes that 2015 will see the new consoles finally hitting their stride.

No Man’s Sky really raises the bar for indie games, and is one of our most anticipated games of 2015.

• Format: PS4 (version reviewed), Xbox One, PC, Xbox 360, PS3
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Activision
• Developer: Sledgehammer Games
• Players: 1-2 (offline), 2-18 (online)
• Site: http://www.callofduty.com/advancedwarfare/

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is the first in the series to benefit from three years of development time. It was created by Sledgehammer Games, who helped co-develop Modern Warfare 3, and sees the series move into the mid-21st century. This jump into the future brings lots of futuristic weaponry, vehicles like hoverbikes and specialised drones, and gives the player an exo-suit that enables you to boost jump, use a grappling hook, and even go all Harry Potter with a cloaking device to turn invisible. While the futuristic setting and James Bond gadgets are a welcome change, are they enough to revolutionise the series or is it merely an evolutionary step for Activision’s multi-billion dollar franchise?

The new exo-suit really adds another dimension to the gameplay in Advanced Warfare.

Advanced Warfare puts the player into the boots of Marine Jack Mitchell, who along with his best friend Will Irons finds himself stationed in South Korea in the midst of a massive North Korean invasion. The Marines manage to repel the invaders, but at the cost of 6000 lives, including Will’s. Jack loses his left arm in the struggle, and on his return is approached by Will’s father played by the imposing Kevin Spacey. Irons offers him a place in his private military company Atlas, who help rebuild Mitchell with a high-tech prosthetic arm and state-of-the-art gear. The plot of Advanced Warfare is along the lines of a James Bond action movie, and it delivers plenty of spectacle in its run time. The graphics are really impressive, especially the highly detailed actors’ faces that are as close to photo-real as you could hope for. The campaign has plenty of bombastic moments as you’d expect, and there is a lot of variety to each of the missions, from protecting your squad while they infiltrate an enemy base with a drone, to grappling your way up a skyscraper, jumping your way along moving cars on a motorway, to using stealth to infiltrate an enemy stronghold. The game always throws something new at you. However, the regular series staples of breaching doors and the linear levels do feel quite tired now, especially when you are given the tremendous power and gadgets of the exo-suit to run riot with. In fact a few of the levels feel overfamiliar, almost to the point of cutting and pasting them from a previous game. That being said the campaign is a lot of fun, and compared to the turkey shoot of Black Ops 2, Advanced Warfare is a marked improvement.

As you’d expect in a Call of Duty, there are plenty of Michael Bay style set pieces. The Golden Gate Bridge is one of the highlights.

Call of Duty wouldn’t be Call of Duty without a multiplayer mode, and Advanced Warfare brings the usual template of Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, and Search and Destroy along with other favourites. The game also has an Exo Survival mode, which is basically the co-op Zombie or Extinction mode from previous games, with your squad (of up to four) attempting to survive increasingly more ferocious waves of enemies. Exo Survival is a nice diversion, but it lacks any co-op specific weapons or levels that made the Zombie mode in Black Ops so good. Exo Survival even uses the same maps from the multiplayer game, which is disappointing considering all the fresh ideas the futuristic setting brings with it. There are thirteen maps available in multiplayer, which have a distinct variety of locales. From the run down streets of Detroit to the futuristic Japanese garden of Greenband, each level has quite a unique setting. The levels are all quite well designed, and during our play test we only noticed a couple of instances of camping, which is a vast improvement from previous entries in the series, where there were more campers than you’d expect at a music festival. The exo-suit adds an extra dimension to the gameplay with the added verticality meaning you need to really be on your guard, as foes can appear out of nowhere, although it can also give you the advantage. The only niggle was in the Greenband level there is a huge drop in the middle of the level, which we fell down countless times as we leaped around. For those players who prefer to play the game the old fashioned way without the manoeuverability of the exo-suit, there is an option to play ‘Classic’ mode which removes the exo-suit abilities; but thereby removes half of the fun.

The grappling hook is a great new gadget, although you don’t get much freedom to use it, which is disappointing.

The gameplay zips along at great pace as you’d expect, and unlike Battlefield 4 it works from day one. We never encountered any lag while playing, and it only crashed once on us during a multiplayer session. The gunplay is as solid as ever, and you can customise every aspect of your avatar, from your boots and helmet to the usual perks and weapon upgrades. There is a new loot system that earns you a supply drop box after each game. This gives you random items such as rare weaponry, an extra perk or multiplayer XP bonus, or an article of character gear to customise your online avatar. Advanced Warfare also has a new game mode in Uplink, which is almost like a game of basketball. Players have to get to the centre of the map to retrieve a satellite drone, they then dash to the enemy uplink station and throw the drone into the station. While you have the ‘ball’ you can pass it on to another player, which means communication is key to winning. We found Uplink to be a great new addition to the multiplayer roster, and it was a whole lot of fun to play.

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is a welcome return to form for the long running series. It’s perhaps a tad disappointing that they have stuck quite rigidly to the successful Call of Duty formula, but you can’t really blame them for playing it safe with so many fans to keep happy. The movement of the exo-suit is a brave new addition, but it works really well and adds another dimension to the gameplay. Advanced Warfare has everything you’d expect from the series, from the set pieces of the linear campaign to the fluid and slick multiplayer. While it’s not quite the revolution that you might hope for, it’s by far the best Call of Duty since the series’ Modern Warfare heyday.

• Format: PS4 (version reviewed), Xbox One, PC
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: 505 Games
• Developer: Eko Software
• Players: 1-2 (online and offline)
• Site: http://howtosurvivethegame.com/

How To Survive was released last year on the last generation of consoles. With what is becoming common practice on the PS4 and Xbox One, Eko Software have brought the game to the new gen with all the DLC included and some graphical tweaks here and there, and repackaged the game as the Storm Warning Edition. So is this upgrade enough to warrant a purchase? Or should the game be left to survive the zombie apocalypse alone on its desert island?

Kovac gives you tips on how to survive the islands of the dead.

How To Survive is, surprisingly enough, a game of survival. You are left stranded on an archipelago of inhospitable islands, and have to keep your character alive by crafting weapons and supplies, by exploring and scavenging any items you find. The island’s inhabitants are a gruesome mix of varying sizes of the undead, crab-like creatures that attach themselves to your leg like a dog in heat, and ‘normal’ hazards like crocodiles and piranhas. As night falls there is the extra danger of attacks from monsters that resemble Gollum from Lord of the Rings.

To keep your character alive you need to keep an eye on your hunger, thirst and fatigue levels. Sustaining these is crucial to avoid your stamina, strength and aim from slowly being eroded. Food can be hunted or scavenged, with animals and plants being your main source of sustenance. Water can be found in wells, and stored in bottles left lying around. There aren’t many places for a good night’s kip, but there are safe houses dotted around where you can put your head down for a short while. On your travels you will encounter other survivors who send you away on errands to fetch items you will need to escape the zombie hellhole. Your plan of escape is to repair a seaplane that you find with one of the survivors. After a short while you meet Kovac, a self-proclaimed master survivor, who is fully clad in armour, and teaches you the skills to survive through his zombie survival guidebook ‘Kovac Rules’. This is done with a fair dose of humour, which helps alleviate the glumness your character is in.

Kovac’s tips can be found lying dotted around the islands. Crafting is the main gameplay element that you use to create weapons to keep the enemy hordes at bay; everything from a fishing rod to bow and arrows and guns can be created by combining various items you find lying around. This is quite a simple process, and the game lets you know what you can combine, although the only way to tell what you are making is by collecting the blueprints dotted around the map. As well as a day and night cycle, the game also adds extra danger from weather conditions that range from rain that extinguishes fire, to fog that hampers visibility and storms that can hit you with lightning if you stay in the same area for too long. The graphics are functional rather than groundbreaking, although some of the lighting effects are quite nice. The isometric viewpoint works fairly well, although there were times we ended up fighting a horde of zombies behind the cover of some trees, which made it impossible to see what was happening.

The flamethrower is the perfect way to barbecue large groups of the undead.

The game includes all the DLC from the previous gen version of the game with an extra island to explore, new characters that give you new abilities (like the ability to craft flamethrowers and chainsaws), and an additional difficulty level called One Shot that only grants you one life to try and finish the game. However, we would only recommend this mode if you are a sadist or a really proficient player. There is also the addition of a new mode called Barricade!, which has you trying to protect a group of survivors by setting traps and building barricades. Barricade! is particularly entertaining, with you rushing out to scavenge items during the day to shore up your defences from an impending night time attack by all manner of nasty creatures. All these modes can be played by two players both online and offline, and it was this mode that gave us the most fun. With the new PlayStation firmware 2.0, we were able to set up a two player game no problem, and it has to be said this changed the game for the better. When you are on your own it can get really frustrating as you struggle to keep huge crowds of zombies at bay. While you can back away from the fight, when you run out of stamina or get injured your character can’t run away and inevitably you are overrun by the crowds of monsters. Having a friend along at least gives you an chance to get revived and fight on, and the extra firepower is also welcome. There was one time when our character was in dire need of a sleep, and the only way to do that was to liberate a safe house. But because our character was so tired we couldn’t run away and we died several times. The only way to do it in the end was to play with a friend who could lure some of the zombies away, giving our character a fighting chance.

Ah, a nice quiet spot for a bit of fishing.

How to Survive: Storm Warning Edition is a decent survival game, but there are far too many niggles that stop it being a great one. The combat lacks any real impact, and the shooting mechanics are a bit imprecise which leads to frustrating moments. The islands are also pretty bland isometric mazes with nothing to differentiate one from another. However playing cooperatively was a lot of fun, and we’d definitely recommend taking a friend along to this desert island of the undead.

• Format: PS4 (version reviewed), Xbox One, PC, Mac
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: 505 Games
• Developer: Hidden Path Entertainment
• Players: 1 (offline), 2 (online)
• Site: http://www.hiddenpath.com/games/defense-grid-2/

Defense Grid 2 is a sequel to the much lauded Defense Grid: The Awakening that was released way back in 2008. It is a tower defence strategy game, that has the player strategically laying out defences to protect the power cores of human colonies from marauding alien forces hell bent on stealing them. The tower defence genre has become quite saturated recently with a whole host of games of varying quality. So does Defense Grid 2 have enough in its armoury to take down the imposters?

The original game was set on a single planet, but this sequel goes to a whole galaxy, with a varied selection of locales to protect. This is really just window dressing, but it does add some nice variety to the quite barren grid-like levels. The graphics are serviceable, but nothing that the previous generation of consoles couldn’t handle. However, when there is a fireworks show of destruction going on that would make Guy Fawkes proud, there is not a hint of slowdown, which helps keep the game flowing nicely. The plot follows General Fletcher, an AI who displays human characteristics, and his battle to protect human colonies from an alien scourge. Fletcher is a returning character from the original game, who is very charismatic and enjoys witty banter with the other characters. To be honest the plot is mostly forgettable, and there were moments where the game lost us with its nonsensical story; but the game never takes itself seriously and has its tongue planted firmly in its cheek, and there were plenty of humorous moments to lighten the mood of destruction.

Things start out quietly, but before long all hell breaks loose.

Defense Grid 2 gives you limited resources to build towers to protect the power cores of each of the levels. There is a wide ranging selection, from the basic Gun and Cannon, to the more powerful and longer range attacks of the Meteor and Missile towers, along with the Temporal unit that slows down the alien horde. The Boost units are used to alter the course of your enemies and you can also build other towers on top of them to increase the attack range, and add other abilities like the Disruptor which takes down enemy shields. There are a lot of combinations that you can use to repel the enemy intruders. In later levels you need to shepherd the aliens along a path of your choosing to enable you to deal with larger waves of speedy aliens and huge armoured beasts that take more of a pounding than Bruce Banner’s alter ego. Thankfully, each of the towers can be upgraded with three main levels of increased power. The towers also receive upgrades as you progress through the game, with increased firepower and the ability to target more powerful enemies, unlocked as you play. All of the towers get utilised at one point or another during the run time of the campaign, and in later levels it is crucial that you combine tower abilities, or you may find your colony overrun, and your power core rapidly depleted.

Altering the course of the alien hordes is an important tactic later on in the game.

We had a lot of fun playing Defense Grid 2. It has that highly addictive one-more-go factor that compels you to keep playing. With the variety of towers, and ever growing roster of enemies and fluctuating difficulty, the game is never predictable and they keep throwing new things at you to keep the experience fresh. There are a huge number of ways to tweak the game, in fact it can get quite bewildering with the amount of options that the game gives you. There is a lot of content in the package too, with the campaign alone taking well over ten hours to complete. You also have a two player co-op option that allows you to play together with friends, and an online competitive mode called Fighter. This has two players building bases on separate maps, and any alien that is killed is sent over to cause chaos on the opposing player’s map, which is quite a compelling scenario. While multiplayer is a lot of fun, at the time of writing there aren’t many players around to battle against (on PS4 at least), so you may have a bit of a wait before you manage to find a game. The game does however let you continue playing the campaign while you wait on an opponent, which is a nice touch.

The banter from General Fletcher is very funny at times.

If you’re hankering after something a bit different we highly recommend giving Defense Grid 2 a go. Its highly addictive blend of gameplay is well supplemented by a decent variety of maps and enemy types that require you to use all the towers and upgrades at your disposal. With a decent length of campaign and the added bonuses of competitive multiplayer and co-op, there is a lot of value and fun to be had from Defense Grid 2 – so go forth and fortify.

• Format: PS4 (version reviewed), Xbox One, Xbox 360, Wii U
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Drinkbox/Activision
• Developer: Drinkbox Studios
• Players: 1-2
• Site: http://guacamelee.com/

Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition is a reworked and tweaked version of last year’s Guacamelee!. It contains all the DLC from the original, along with extra areas to explore, new enemies and a brand new boss fight. The gameplay has also been tweaked, and the player is given extra abilities to use on their quest. But does this new version warrant a purchase if you’ve already played the original?

If you’ve never played Guacamelee! before, the game is a gorgeous 2D platform brawler that is clearly influenced by the original Metroid and the folklore and culture of Mexico. You play the role of Juan Aguacate, a farmer turned Luchador, who takes on the evil skeletal Carlos Calaca, master of the dead, and his minions in a quest to rescue El Presidente’s daughter, and literally kick the dark forces back to where they came from. Things don’t go too well for Juan at the start of the game, and he is killed by Calaca, only to be reincarnated as a masked superhero with a thirst for vengeance.

You don’t want to wake this big chap up!

Juan has a selection of basic brawling moves that can be expanded with some grappling attacks on stunned foes, to dish out big damage. You can also pick up and throw stunned enemies at groups of minions, which is handy when you are up against it. Defeating your foes earns you coins which can be spent at altars dotted throughout the levels. These can be used to buy new abilities or to increase Juan’s health and stamina bars, and also to buy new costumes to customise your hero.

You need your special moves to break these skeletons’ shields.

As you progress through the game, there are various Choozo statues scattered around that have been hidden by an old man who is disguised as a goat. Yes, an old man disguised as a goat. These statues can be broken (much to the dismay of the old man) and each give Juan a new power. These powers can be used to create powerful combos, or break down brick barriers as well as enemy shields. The Rooster Uppercut, for instance, gives off a red glow when performed. It can be used to destroy red bricks and red enemy shields. This colour coding is also used with other powers, so you know what move to use where and when. You can also unlock double jumps, wall jumping and Polo Power, which turns you into a chicken, so you can access small tunnels. Perhaps the most interesting power is the ability to transport yourself between the land of the living and the land of the dead. This opens up some very interesting puzzles where you have to swiftly change from one dimension to the next, as a barrier or deathtrap is only present in one of the dimensions. This is also the same for enemies; as some of them appear as shadows in one dimension and are impervious to your attacks, which means you have to change to the alternate dimension in order to give them a beating. Some of them can be quite a test of your reactions – and the old grey matter – and it’s extremely satisfying when you manage to complete them.

El Trio de la Muerte is the impressive new boss in the Super Turbo Championship Edition of the game.

The game contains a number of humorous homages to various gaming icons. There are posters dotted around the levels that are nods at games like Super Mario Bros, Megaman, Minecraft, Zelda and many more. Mario also gets a pleasing musical homage in the Great Temple, when the music changes to a well known riff of the series. Indeed the game has a lot of funny moments, and the new boss El Trio De La Muerte is both humorously designed and well integrated into the story. Another change worth mentioning is the addition of INTENSO! mode. This adds another bar below your health and special ability bars, which when fully charged lets Juan unleash a barrage of blows for a short period of time. This makes the combat much more frenetic, and less nuanced, but it is only used sparingly as the bar decreases rapidly if you take hits and struggle to keep your combos going.

Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition is a fantastic upgrade to an already great game. It is a stunning game to look at, with bright colourful graphics which are beautifully animated, and some of the larger enemies are quite stunning to behold. The soundtrack is also fantastic with catchy mariachi band tunes that become haunting and surreal when you flit into the world of the dead. The puzzles and platforming are well designed and the combat works well; although it can get quite repetitive later on in the game, when you are fighting wave after wave of enemies you have faced before. The new elite enemy class is also quite frustrating to fight, as they teleport around the level when their health gauge is low. The new levels and boss battle are well integrated into the new game, and the new INTENSO power is a welcome addition. If you’ve not played Guacamelee!, the Super Turbo Championship Edition is the version to buy – but even if you have played it already it’s well worth playing again if you have just upgraded to the next gen consoles.

Last year’s E3 was all about the new consoles from Sony and Microsoft, but thankfully this year the focus was purely on the games. While there were no poor shows, there weren’t any ‘wow’ moments either, with most of the new games on show scheduled to launch in 2015.

Sunset Overdrive looked pretty bonkers in a good way.

Microsoft hit back with plenty of games announcements this year, after last year’s debacle. However there was nothing on show that would make me want to rush out and buy an Xbox One. Perhaps I expected too much from them, but there was nothing that blew me away. Sure games like Sunset Overdrive, Crackdown and Scalebound look quite interesting, but Sunset Overdrive was the only title that showed off actual gameplay and, while it looked suitably bonkers, and a bit like a cross between Infamous and Ratchet and Clank, it looked like a lot of fun to play. The Halo: Master Chief Collection looks like great value if you are a Halo fan, or want to sample the series for the first time on your new Xbox One. Some of the indie titles looked superb with Cuphead showing off a beautiful 1930’s era illustrated look, and Moon Studio’s Ori and the Blind Forest looking like a stunning 2D platformer in the mould of Rayman Legends.

See that moon up there? You can jump in your little ship and fly straight to it.

Sony had a pretty decent show again this year with Bloodborne looking like it could be a cracking new franchise under the direction of the Dark Souls developers From Software. LittleBigPlanet 3 was a pleasant surprise, although aside from a few new characters to join Sackboy in his quest, it doesn’t seem to revolutionise the series. Sony also showed off the remastered The Last of Us, and the upgraded GTA V, which both looked very impressive; although whether you want to shell out full price for slightly upgraded versions of games you’ve already played, is open for debate. The announcement of the remastered Grim Fandango was a shock, that will have graphic adventure fans salivating. The first look at Uncharted 4 was very impressive, although I hope the sombre tone of the trailer isn’t indicative of the game itself. Sony continued their indie love-in by showcasing ABZU, which looks quite similar to Journey, but set under the sea, with colourful visuals and the chilled-out atmosphere of Journey. For me, No Man’s Sky was the star of E3, and looked absolutely phenomenal. It was like watching Elite Dangerous while under the influence of hallucinogenic drugs. What disappointed me most about Sony’s conference was the no show of The Last Guardian or Agent, which have been in development purgatory for far too long now. We can only hope that they are perhaps saving them for later in the year.

Splatoon was a big surprise announcement from Nintendo.

I didn’t hold up much hope for Nintendo, but I have to say their Nintendo Direct show was fantastic. They had plenty of new games to show off, and even some brand new titles. The big news was the announcement that a new Star Fox is in development for the Wii U, and it looks very promising, and seems to utilise the gamepad a lot more than other recent titles. Nintendo also showed off two new concepts: Project Giant Robot and Project Guard, which look to be in the experimental phase of development, but it’s heartening to know that they are developing some brand new properties. They also announced a new 3DS title, Codename: S.T.E.A.M. from the well regarded developer Intelligent Systems. Splatoon is Nintendo’s version of the online shooter, and reminded me of a cross between De Blob and an intense game of paintball. It looks like it could be an interesting take on the shooter genre, with players covering the game area in their colour of ink, as well as shooting one another. You are able to morph into squids to hide in the ink, and then surprise your enemy, and it looks like a whole lot of fun. I have to say that the new Zelda trailer that they showed looked absolutely stunning, and showed off a beautiful art style, that is a cross between the Wind Waker’s cel-shaded visuals, and the recent Skyward Sword. With the promise that the game is open world, it looks like a fantastic evolution of the series.

You’ve got to love the wanton destruction of Far Cry 4, even if the escape car leaves a lot to be desired!

Of the third party developers I’d say Ubisoft had the best show, with Rainbow Six Siege impressing me with its co-op gameplay and extensive destruction. The Division looks as stunning as always, as does Assassins Creed Unity. But the game I’m looking forward to the most is Far Cry 4, which looks like an impressive follow up to the fantastic Far Cry 3. EA had a decent show as well with the next gen Mass Effect and Star Wars Battlefront making their fleeting first appearances, alongside Mirror’s Edge 2. Although what was shown was more of a tease, with these titles perhaps over a year away or more. SEGA had the impressively tense Alien Isolation on show, which we have high hopes will wash away the stench of the hugely disappointing Aliens: Colonial Marines.

It’s difficult to pick an overall ‘winner’ of E3, as all three of the console manufacturers had decent shows. I thought Sony and Microsoft were a bit cagey with their announcements, and it almost felt like they were holding back a few of their biggest reveals. Microsoft had a lot to prove after last year’s showing, and they did a great job of concentrating on the games they have coming down the pipeline. Sony are still on a high after the successful launch of the PS4, and really didn’t have to do much to stay on top, but their show had lots of interesting content; although the Vita got sadly neglected. It was very pleasing to see Nintendo showing off some brand new concepts, and I hope they have learned from their lacklustre console launches, that they need great games to sell their hardware. Overall E3 was pretty good, but there were no major surprise announcements that would have made it a great year.