A company with the resources of EA and the
license of Star Wars should be a match made in heaven. However, despite
actually releasing a couple of good games, EA and Star Wars have not been the
perfect match that many of us hoped they would.
These two joined forces back in 2013 when
Disney signed a ten year deal with EA to make Star Wars video games. EA and
Star Wars have been in the news this week thanks to EA canceling what was sounding like a really promising open-world Star Wars games from the folks at EA
Vancouver.
The word is that the long development time
is why they canned it and instead they want them to work on a quick game that
can be out in the next year or year and a half!
EA scored some cool points when they said
that they were bringing Star Wars Battlefront back. That first Battlefront game
was a rather barebones experience, but most felt that it set the groundwork for what could be a truly epic
sequel.
Then in 2017, EA gave us Star Wars Battlefront
II and they kicked things up several notches. They increased everything that
the first game offered and they even added in what was a pretty cool single
player campaign…… oh and they also brought the industry to its knees with its
unfair Microtransactions and locking popular characters behind an unfair
paywall.
What Is EA Doing With The Star Wars License?
EA could not have been prepared for the
storm of negativity that came their way because of Battlefront II. The amount
of currency required to unlock a character like Darth Vader was insane. I am
sure some guy worked it out that it was something like 30 to 40 hours of
gameplay to get him! Of course, you could
try and spend real money if you like to try and get him.
Star Wars Battlefront II was a fun game
that had some great features, but because of the greed of EA, many people were
not willing to give it a chance. I still stand by the fact that Battlefront II
is a good game, but I am so glad that EA got dragged over the coals for what
they tried to pull.
I wonder what the future of the Star Wars
franchise at EA will be. I am guessing that it is very unlikely that Disney
will keep this partnership going once the ten years are up!
2019 has already had some awesome released,
but even more, great games are on the
way. Here are just a few of the games due out in the coming months that need to
be on your radar.
Yoshi’s Crafted World
Yoshi’s Wooly World was a fantastic game
and this follow up looks to be taking things to the next level. The Yoshi
series has always been about having fun and fun is what Yoshi’s Crafted World
looks like. Hopefully, it will have as
many collectibles as Wooly World did as I
loved collecting all the different yarn Yoshi’s.
UPPERS
There are not enough beat em up style games
in the style of things like Final Fight or even a Power Stone. UPPERS though is
a game that is bringing the beat em up back. Full of kick-butt action, crazy combos and a ton of attitude! UPPERS is one of the more underrated
games that is due out this year. Make sure you take a closer look at this one.
Tom Clancy’s The Division 2
Full disclosure here I am not the biggest
fan of The Division, but I know that a lot of people are super stoked for Tom
Clancy’s The Division 2. This is If you loved the open world RPG style action
of the first game, you are no doubt going to be all in with the sequel.
Devil May Cry 5
I thought that DMC was a great game…. Not
joking I really did, but I did want something that would follow on from the
excellent Devil May Cry 4. That is what Capcom is
doing with Devil May Cry 5. The action looks slick and insane and that is
exactly what you need in a Devil May Cry game.
Dead or
Alive 6
The Dead or Alive series is pretty awesome
and while the fighting game genre is getting pretty overcrowded these days.
Dead or Alive 6 is doing more than enough to make it stand out from the crowd.
Dead or Alive 6 features a whole new game engine. This makes the game smoother,
faster…… and bouncier than ever before. Seriously this game is just pure eye
candy! The way the fighters display damage as the fight goes on is really cool.
You cannot go wrong with the Dead or Alive series and this game looks to breathe some new life into the franchise.
February 13th was the first
“real” Nintendo Direct in what felt like ages. There were some great games
shown and today I want to talk about a few that really caught my attention.
The Legend of Zelda: Links Awakening
There was a rumor that a new 2D Zelda game
was going to be shown at this Nintendo Direct and the one that was shown did
not disappoint. This is a remake of the GameBoy game, Link’s Awakening which
was the follow on from Link to the Past. The game looks like a million bucks
and Link has a real chibi look to him. The gameplay looks to keep the classic
overhead Zelda style and that is awesome!
Super Mario Maker 2
While it was not the 3D Super Mario Maker
that I was hopeful for, Super Mario Maker 2 looks to be a lot of fun. There are
loads more things that you can use this time around such as slopes, new
enemies, power-ups and so on. They have
also included a bunch of stuff from Mario 3D World so it will be interesting to
see how that translates into a 2D Mario game. What is crazy is that Super Mario
Maker 2 is coming in June!
Astral Chain
Of all the games that were shown at this
Nintendo Direct, it was Astral Chain that
really blew me away. This is an action packed 3rd person action hack
and slash game from the people at Platinum Games. It looks fantastic and like it is going to be a whole lot of fun. It
features mechs, monsters, a robot dog, crazy fast combat and just a whole lot
of over the top action that makes it look like one of the most interesting
Switch games for 2019.
Crackdown 3 was supposed to be the first
huge Xbox One exclusive of the year. It was the game that was going to show
Xbox One fans that Xbox still has some awesome exclusive games just like the other
two consoles do.
In all honesty, a lot of people were very
excited for Crackdown 3 and with good reason too. The trailers showcased a game
that looked like it was a ton of fun and it even had Terry Crews in the trailer
so that was awesome.
Now that the game is released though, many major gaming sites are not all
that impressed. Over at both GameSpot and IGN, Crackdown 3 has been given the
middle of the road average 5 out of 10 score.
Both sites call the game underwhelming, rather boring and not all that great!
On Metacritic,
you can see that the game (as I write this) is sitting at a rating of 60 from
game review scores and at a 4.0 from player review scores. Clearly, Crackdown 3 is a game that is
disappointing a lot of people out there. It is kind of like what happened with
Sea of Thieves. It was billed at this huge exclusive game that was going to be
awesome, but then when it was released it was very underwhelming.
Perhaps it can be turned around and have
more fun elements put into it like was done with Sea of Thieves. The problem
with that is while for Sea of Thieves players that has been great many people
simply lost interest in the game and I have a feeling that Crackdown 3 could
end up being the same.
This console generation Sony has been nailing it with the exclusives and of course, so have Nintendo. You have to wonder
why Microsoft has found it so hard to
compete in this regard?