The Bureau: XCOM Declassified - Part 1

Welcome To XCOM

So, about 8 hours into The Bureau, and I've come to a conclusion about myself: I should never be allowed to lead a group of soldiers in any situation. The very first combat scenario where you can actually lose a guy, I did. We hadn't even left the base, and he was shot dead! Under my command...

Poor bastard never even got to kill anyone

But anyway, on to more positive notes! The Bureau is actually pretty awesome so far! The shooting is solid, the combat can actually be tactically challenging and Carter is a drunken badass. Like seriously, you can straight up get him wasted in the middle of the base at one point and no one bats an eye. Granted, the game isn't without flaws, like the story being a bit haphazard, but generally good voice acting makes it a decent trip anyway.

The 60s aesthetic is pretty awesome too. It's pretty neat walking around the base and just see everyone is waistcoats, smoking like there's no tomorrow. The game even has a thin layer of smoke in some rooms that add to the effect and it's goes a long way to add to the atmosphere in really nice way.

Alien invasion? Nothing a little whiskey won't solve!

For a game with such a troubled development, The Bureau has been pretty good so far, solid in most aspects, but not groundbreaking in any way. I guess we have to see how the second half of the game holds up to get a full opinion.

The Bureau: XCOM Declassified - Introduction

If you had told me that XCOM, a classic turn-based strategy game, would be mixed with Mad Men-like aesthetics, wrapped up in a Mass Effect-style third person shooter, I'd laugh it off as a publishers wanting to boil everything down to the lowest common denominator to sell more copies. And to be fair, gamers did whenever this game was first announced. We asked why an XCOM game in the style of the original couldn't exist in the 21st century, and we got what we wanted in XCOM: Enemy Unknown, and it was awesome!

It's time to slap some asses and kill some aliens

But what happened to the game that was announced? Well, it went dark for a year or two before being repackaged as The Bureau: XCOM Declassified, set in Cold War-era America when aliens makes first contact and start a planet-wide war. And it plays exactly like they promised: Mass Effect, right down to the squad combat and the strangely similar powers you can unlock for William Carter and his soldiers, and even having a hub area to return to and talk to your colleagues.

However, it still manages to capture some aspects of XCOM, namely, the permanent death of your squad members, the customisation and even the enemies you face are all enemies that are in XCOM: Enemy Unknown.

So I go into The Bureau cautiously optimistic, Yes, this is a game with a troubled development cycle, but it's also set in a fantastic universe, and is taking aspects from the original series, and from one of the most critically acclaimed third person shooters in recent memory. And it looks like Mad Men, which is just the icing on the cake, to be honest.

Borderlands 2 - Completion

Danger! Excitement! Mustaches!

There have been some pretty massive swings in my mood while playing these last two add-ons, and it makes writing up my feelings of Borderlands 2 overall much more difficult. On one hand, the game is brilliant in what it sets out to achieve and be: an FPS-action RPG. On the other hand, there are some glaring flaws that are made much more apparent while playing through the DLC. But let's talk about the final two add-ons first!

All style, no substance

Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt brought to the forefront a problem that is hard to notice in the main game: when there are no good characters driving the narrative, Borderlands becomes a very bog-standard shooter that can border on kind of terrible. The reason this became so apparent was because, other than Hammerlock, a feeble excuse for a villain  and a small cameo from Claptrap, there are no other characters relative to the story. Hammerlock isn't bad, but not well written enough to be the core focus of a plot.

It became so bad that after the first set of side missions, I just tore through the main plot line and let the rest of the content alone. The only one positive I can draw the experience is the location is really nice, and looks really refreshing compared to the rest of the main game. Other than that, there is no reason to play Big Game Hunt, unless you hate yourself.

Now we're talking!

Tiny Tina's Assault On Dragon Keep is one of the most imaginative pieces of DLC I've seen for any game. In an era where DLC is usually just a bunch of reused assets from the main game, it's nice to see a developer basically design an entirely new style of game and give it out as DLC. It's been done before with Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, and I hope it's a trend that continues in the future. Placing the Borderlands character's in a Dungeons & Dragons setting works surprisingly well and breaths new life into the game.

The humour hits, the new enemies are genuinely unique, and the area is nice and suits the setting. Making the entire game take place in Tiny Tina's head is pretty smart as well, as it allows the game to change on a whim, such as the first first encounter changing when Lilith complains about the difficulty. However, it all kind of falls apart...

Best gatekeeper ever!!

It becomes really clear in most of the boss fights are balanced with co-op play in mind, and I don't blame because that's what makes Borderlands much more fun and enjoyable, but it ruins it for people like me who are playing by themselves. Bosses that have a near-one hit kills, leaving the player with nothing to kill in order to revive themselves are a recurring problem and makes the game much more frustrating.

If I had to rank them, I'd say that Mr.Torgue's Campaign Of Carnage is easily the best DLC if you just want pure, unadulterated mayhem and fun, with Assault On Dragon Keep coming second. Pirate Booty and Big Game Hunt aren't worth looking at unless you really enjoy the combat, or are playing it with a group of friends.

A diamond pony...as a queen

All in all, I still liked Borderlands 2 after playing 65 hours of it, but not as much as the first one. It has it's flaws, there is no doubt about that, but it still manages to have a lot of charm and laughs along that way that make it easier to look past the flaws and just enjoy yourself. A lot of my problems probably could have been lessened if I had a group to play with, but then that raises the bigger question of why should a game be unbalanced for solo play. The characters are still great, the gunplay is still fun and the stories told can be nonsensical in their own, awesome way. It's just such a shame that so many flaws stop this from being a much better game than the original, but I look forward to seeing what comes out next, especially if they finally take the MMO-route with the franchise.

To the future...

Next up...The Bureau: XCOM Declassified! 

Borderlands 2 - Part 3

I'm Here To Ask You One Question, And One Question Only: EXPLOSIONS?!

After the poor showing of the main story, I gotta say that these two pieces of DLC have been fucking incredible. My frustrations are gone, I'm enjoying the game again and they are just downright hilarious at times. Not without their flaws, but definitely a step up from the end of the main game.

A mighty fine booty, as well

I don't know where to start with this story, but I'll just flat out say that I went in with zero expectations considering my feelings at the end of the main game. I was expecting to slog through this, do the bare minimum and be done with it. But that all changed as soon as I started playing it. The new characters were refreshing, the new guns addressed one of my main issues with the quests towards the end of game not giving you better weapons and the enemies were actually a decent level and not overpowered. In short: it made the game fun again.

Yeah, she totally does

The new characters also made things a lot better. Scarlett fits right into the universe and is actually an interesting character, with her constant ditzy ramblings, and constantly reminding you that she isn't going to betray you...yet. C3n50r807 is pretty funny too, in his one-robot crusade against all things inappropriate. The characters fit into the story well too, but that leads me to my major criticism about Pirate's Booty, which is a complaint I had about the main game: the story just ends with little-to-no conclusion.

You kill the last boss (not even Scarlett, it's some random giant monster), find the treasure, and then the credits roll. That's it, no conclusion with Scarlett, she just fucks off somewhere between her betraying you and making it to the final area. There's no conclusion at all really, but it leaves room for Scarlett to return in a sequel, which is a good thing. Overall, DLC number one was pretty good, but, and I'm gonna be blunt, DLC two is where is fun is...

TESTOSTERONE! 

I don't typically laugh out loud during games, it's more a under my breath chuckle. However, that all changed during Mister Torgue's Campaign Of Carnage...everything in here is fucking hilarious! Between Torgue's constant yelling and steroid-fueled insanity, he easily ranks up there as the best character is Borderlands ever. He's basically Hulk Hogan, but if Hulk Hogan was snorting mountains of cocaine, in addition to taking steroids. I didn't think I'd ever hear a character yell "BLOWJOBS!" in a video game, but it happened.

This totally isn't my desktop wallpaper...

The story is basically a parody of old action films and the troupes you would typically see in them, and blowing them completely out of proportion. And the best part is, it works. The humour, the characters, the plot, it all comes together to create a pretty damn hilarious, and enjoyable couple of hours. And the story wraps up nicely for once!

Overall, if the rest of the DLC even comes close to the heights of Campaign Of Carnage, I'll call Borderlands 2 a success. If it doesn't, then I'll probably still be happy with my time with Borderlands 2, but more so because of what it could've been and the ideas of what the franchise could become, not what it was.

Yup, that's totally the name of the main area

I'll leave the opening of Campaign Of Carnage here as well, just to give an example of the humour and how insane it becomes.

Borderlands 2 - Part 2

Ain't No Rest For The Wicked

The fact that that line was spoken by a character is a brilliant throwback to, quite possibly, the best opening cinematic to any video games ever. I loved Borderlands' intro, and setting it to the Cage The Elephant song set the tone perfectly. Anyway, that was a side note, onward to criticism!

All downhill from here

I always loved how the guns felt in Borderlands. It's probably the only FPS that I feel I could say I'm pretty damn good at. Games like Call of Duty or Halo never seemed to click with me on any substantial level, but Borderlands always seemed to be perfect for me. It was 'arcade' enough for it to remain fast-paced and chaotic, but the bullets had weight and travel to them which made it still a thinking process of how to go about each encounter.

Which leads me to my biggest criticism of the game: it's balanced incredibly poorly. Once I decided to stop doing some of the side-quests in order to speed up my playthrough, I immediately began noticing that enemies were constantly a higher level than me, to an unfair point when it came to the last area. It seems very counter-intuitive for a game (that, for the most part, will slightly adjust an area's enemies to match your own character's level) to have enemies that are four to five levels higher than myself, leading to a frustrating experience and the entire game leaving a sour taste in my mouth.

So she isn't a real person...disappointing!

Another bum note is the story. I'm not exactly coming to Borderlands 2 for a thought-provoking and engaging plot, but the game just kinda ends, with no meaningful ending or conclusion apart from "Hey, you murdered Jack, good job!" That's it, killed him, some very slight set-up for another game and credits. The first game had a similar problem, but set-up a sequel so much better, with the mystery of who, or what, Angel was. The side stories encountered in the side quests were more engaging and more rewarding than anything the main story offered, and that's just down to poor writing.

I'll leave a full break-down of my feelings until after I finish the DLC, since the add-ons for the first game were pretty amazing, so my feelings may change. But at the end of the main game, Borderlands 2 has really let me down in those final five-ten hours, and it's a damn shame that it does so. I leave you with one last thought...

Fuck you, Jack