June 2011 PC / console games

[ffc]

GT preview video of June 2011 releases. I don't remember a month with as many releases where I had at least a passing interest in every PC / console release (confetti added for Morfiend):

• Hunted: The Demon's Forge - 5/31 [honorary June]

• inFAMOUS 2 - 6/7 [PS3 only]

• Red Faction: Armageddon - 6/7

• Operation Flashpoint: Red River - 6/7

• Duke Nukem Forever - 6/14

• Alice: Madness Returns - 6/14

• F.E.A.R. 3 - 6/21

• Shadows of the Damned - 6/21 [console only]

• Dungeon Siege III - 6/21

• Call of Juarez: The Cartel - 6/28

With polished games like Mortal Kombat going on sale soon after release for $40 and Portal 2's $30 PC / $40 console price I wonder if these can command $50 PC / $60 console.

[01101010]

GT preview video of June 2011 releases. I don't remember a month with as many releases where I had at least a passing interest in every PC / console release:

• Hunted: The Demon's Forge - 5/31 (honorary June)
• inFAMOUS 2 - 6/7 (PS3 only)
• Red Faction: Armageddon - 6/7
• Operation Flashpoint: Red River - 6/7
• Duke Nukem Forever - 6/14
• Alice: Madness Returns - 6/14
• F.E.A.R. 3 - 6/21
• Shadows of the Damned - 6/21 (console only)
• Dungeon Siege III - 6/21
• Call of Juarez: The Cartel - 6/28

With polished games like Mortal Kombat going on sale soon after release for $40 and Portal 2's $30 PC / $40 console price I wonder if these can command $50 PC / $60 console.

Having the F.E.A.R. series, I am slightly interested in 3. By that, I mean I will definitely get it when it goes on $5 steam special.

[Morfiend]

What, no links and screenshots? What kind of list is this? 

[ffc]

This is no Velorath extravaganza.  Think Kmart, not Saks.  Clips of everything are in the GT link you bum. 

[Rasix]

I don't think I'll buy a single title off that list.  I honestly haven't really been following any of those titles.

[Paelos]

I took a glace at Dungeon Siege. Not sure what to do with that one.

[Hawkbit]

I was interested to see what shook out for Hunted, but I can buy it in a store and there's not a single review up for it. 

Dungeon Siege, well I'll have to see on that one too.  I want a Diablo clone for my PS3.... but not a bad one.

Infamous 2 - the demo is great.  Looks as if you liked the first one, you'll like this one.  Framerate was really smooth.

[Malakili]

Honestly that list doesn't really impress me.  I guess DNF is worthy of note, just because, but I don' plan on buying a single one of those titles, at least not until they are trivially cheap on Steam.  I could always be swayed by a great review or two, but nothing is OMG Must Have.

[Ingmar]

I might try the Red Faction one when it hits sale price. Otherwise nothing too interesting to me personally, although there are a couple titles there I don't recognize at all and will have to look up.

[Velorath]

This is no Velorath extravaganza.  Think Kmart, not Saks.  Clips of everything are in the GT link you bum. 

Nothing so far this year has inspired me to make a list.  Holiday season looks good (although I'm somewhat disappointed by Last Guardian and Mass Effect 3 getting pushed into next year).  Of the list for this month, I'm looking forward to Infamous 2, and waiting for the reviews on Hunted, Shadows of the Damned, and Dungeon Siege.  Most of the rest of that list are franchises I've never been interested in.

[ffc]

Going to sprinkle in clips/screenshots to save others some googling.

[Velorath]

That's how it starts.  Soon you'll be putting in pictures and amazon links.

[Hawkbit]

On second thought, the whole thing about Hunted is weird.  There are multi-sectional ads displayed all across IGN and Metacritic for Hunted, yet nobody has a review for a game that has been out for two days.  If it were a little publisher, I'd think that was normal.  But this is Bethesda. 

[caladein]

Aside from hoping that Alice is good/does well, this month may as well not exist.  Maybe I'll pick up that new Red Faction on a steep discount if there's a way to turn off motion blur.  Last one was fun until my body decided it didn't agree with it.

[KallDrexx]

I'm interested in Infamous 2 and Red Faction.  The previous of both games were really fun in my opinion.  Unfortunately, I"m a cheap bastard and only buy games used or on sale so I won't be playing either for a while.

[UnSub]

Shadows of the Damned looks insane enough to be hilarious. Or awful.

Might look at Alice at some point, but I've already got a backlog and mentally set my next my next game purchase as either Alan Wake or The Witcher 2 (but I'm waiting for further patches on that one).

[Sky]

Lots of maybe titles for Steam xmas sale 2012. Or maybe even 2011.

My radar is ME3, Witcher 2 and TOR. And a vain hope for RDR PC version, lest I have to buy a console.

[MisterNoisy]

Dungeon Siege 3 demo turned me off that title, and the rest are things I'll pick up after the first discount, if at all.  My brother and I picked up OpFlash: Dragon Rising during the Steam sale, and it's been pretty fun, so I could see possibly picking the new OpFlash sooner than that, though. 

I have a feeling that the new RF game is going to be a pretty big disappointment, given that they took away the 'free-roaming sandbox' parts I liked about the last one so much.

Looking forward to November, though:  Saints Row 3, Skyrim, Battlefield 3, etc.

[Sky]

SR3 and Skyrim have things to prove to me, given SR2's shoddy PC port and Oblivion's yawn-fest. Actually, Skyrim is probably best saved for Steam sale, once modders fix Bethesda's horrible design quirks.

[ffc]

Dungeon Siege 3's online multiplayer is not what I expected.  You are limited to the host's field of view, and the host keeps multiplayer saves so your loot/xp stays with that game.  Blah.

I'm trying Hunted on PS3 today.  Please don't be terrible.

[kildorn]

http://www.metacritic.com/game/xbox-360/hunted-the-demons-forge

I find it really odd and worrisome that Hunted basically has no major reviews up, days after it's release from a major publisher.

Someone dropped the ball big time on the marketing push, since they bought ads EVERYWHERE and obviously had a marketing department, but nobody seems to be reviewing it.

[HaemishM]

I don't think I'll buy a single title off that list.  I honestly haven't really been following any of those titles.

This. I didn't see a thing interesting in there. Catherine is the next big console release I'm interested in until Madden, FIFA or Dark Souls comes out.

[jakonovski]

You forgot DNF.

Infamous 2 is probably the only good title on that list. It's probably going to be GOTY material.

[HaemishM]

DNF is one of those I probably wouldn't pay full price for. It looks fun, but I can't help but think it'll be a bargain Steam game this Christmas.

[Azazel]

On second thought, the whole thing about Hunted is weird.  There are multi-sectional ads displayed all across IGN and Metacritic for Hunted, yet nobody has a review for a game that has been out for two days.  If it were a little publisher, I'd think that was normal.  But this is Bethesda. 

I find it more ominous for the game than weird, actually....

With polished games like Mortal Kombat going on sale soon after release for $40 and Portal 2's $30 PC / $40 console price I wonder if these can command $50 PC / $60 console.

I'd suggest waiting a month or two before buying any of these, unless you NEED THEM RIGHT NOW. I can see pretty much the lot of them them dropping in price very quickly. Particularly when the next wave of releases starts to hit.

[Kail]

Got DNF on pre-order.  Not that I think it's going to be amazing or anything, but I was really psyched about this game back in the Pleiostocene era, and it might turn out okay.  I expect to kill a few evenings with it, if it surprises me and turns out to be awesome, all the better, but I'm not expecting it to really live up to DN3D.

Red Faction looks disappointing to me.  Guerilla was amazing, just a few dabs of polish away from being a really mind blowing experience.  Red Faction 1 was a forgettable piece of generic nothing.  Anything that moves the series away from Guerilla and towards the original is something I'm likely to stay the hell away from.

[Morfiend]

http://www.metacritic.com/game/xbox-360/hunted-the-demons-forge

I find it really odd and worrisome that Hunted basically has no major reviews up, days after it's release from a major publisher.

Someone dropped the ball big time on the marketing push, since they bought ads EVERYWHERE and obviously had a marketing department, but nobody seems to be reviewing it.

Having been burned by a few games recently, I was also waiting for reviews and find it very odd there are none. This is supposed to be a big AAA title isnt it?

[Rasix]

Few reviews are out. It hasn't cracked 70 on any of them.

[Tarami]

And as we all know, since no game with marketing has practically ever gotten under 40%, 70% is really 30%.

[Kitsune]

I've got a preorder on infamous 2 because I'm a whore who's easily bought with preorder bonus stuff.  Alice and Duke are both on my list, and will be gotten if they manage not to suck.

[ffc]

​Played a couple hours of Hunted: Demon's Forge. I'll post thoughts after I do online multiplayer. So far it's good. Metacritic can be off for hard to peg games like with Nier, not that Hunted is nearly as genre bending and wacky. Same jank though.

I'd say the gauge of interest should be if this clip looks fun, then you'll have fun as two adventurers adventuring.  Jump to 7m40s for a sample of bow (ranged) / sword (melee) action.  Just note the FOV is limited when using the bow so when running around I switch to a melee weapon.

Poor scores may be because this neither Gears of War: Fantasy nor is it an RPG. It's faster / simpler (streamlined?) than either. I read the Eurogamer review and subjective things like not liking accents (they're fine) or banter (good, sometimes corny) shouldn't scare anybody off if the clip I linked looks fun.

[Hawkbit]

From the 10 minutes I watched, it actually looks pretty fun.  I'm interested to see what you think overall.

[ffc]

Played a bunch more of Hunted.  I'd summarize it as an arcade dungeon crawler (Gauntletish) in terms of depth and pace. For example, there's no inventory or towns, skills go up through use so there's no skill points, loot is simply yoinking better items, and it's linear with surprisingly big secret areas.   It's fun single player but really shines with two players on Hardcore (can't button mash, must ration potions, shields often break, etc.) using the environment like cover and choke points for ranged to be ranged and melee to tank.

The big issue is no drop in/out online coop (and no vertical widescreen local coop, only horizontal 4:3). Online coop is praying to GameSpy to be matched up with a competent partner willing to play the same areas you do. Voice chat on the PS3 works when it feels like it.  Full price continues to sting with things like chopping grass sounding like steel on steel whereas chopping stone is silent, strange invisible walls, random online sync issues, can't order the AI partner like in Majin, blah graphics, etc.

Even with all these negatives if you are looking for an arcade dungeon crawler you'll enjoy the levels, teamwork and story / banter / voices (Xena voices a character, which was a surprise).