Gamer's Outpost Press (Archived)

by John Archer

Nothing makes me laugh more than the ongoing obsession with the Xbox One’s difficulties rendering games at a full 1080p resolution.

Gaming forums are full of scathing comments from PS4 fan boys about how the Xbox One delivering a number of its games with resolutions a few lines less than 1080 proves Microsoft MSFT -0.65%’s console is rubbish. Even the editorial sections of most gaming sites have fallen prey to navel gazing and technical over-analysis on the same subject.

What every single person who gets caught up in these hilariously petty arguments fails to recognise is that actually the PS4 and Xbox One are both past their sell by dates. In fact, they’ve been living on borrowed time from the very day they launched. Why? Because neither of them truly support 4K.

This argument might initially seem a stretch to ‘normal’ people not involved day to day in the inner workings of the AV industry. But I’m confident that within as little as 12 months most of you will agree that their inability to deliver games at a ‘4K’ or Ultra High Definition (UHD) resolution of 3840×2160 pixels – or something close to it, at least – will make both the supposedly ‘next generation’ consoles feel like yesterday’s news.

The main reason I say this is the exceptional speed with which 4K screens are being produced and adopted. On the production side, at the time of writing Amazon already lists nearly 60 4K/UHD TVs starting from as little as $339, and I’ve spoken to a number of people working in TV hardware production who foresee a situation where possibly by the end of 2015 and almost certainly by the end of 2016 it will difficult to buy a decent big-screen TV that doesn’t carry a native 4K resolution.

It’s not just the manufacturers saying this, either. For instance, AV industry legend Joe Kane, of Joe Kane Productions, stated during a presentation at the recent IFA technology show in Berlin that ‘a year or two from now you won’t be able to buy a 1080p TV.’

Where sales are concerned, 4K TVs have already achieved a 6% global sales penetration despite currently costing considerably more than 1080p TVs. And with 4K prices plummeting daily and 4K panels rapidly supplanting 1080p ones on shop shelves, this 4K penetration figure is going to explode in the next 12-24 months. Far faster, I suggest, than the (in any case impressive) rates of 4K market penetration predicted recently by the likes of the Digitimes Research Group.

What we’re very soon going to have, then, is a situation where console gamers – many of whom tend to be early adopters of new TV technologies, don’t forget – are having to play 1080p (at best) games on 4K screens. This will quickly start to create a sense of frustration for players, especially given the obvious obsession in a large section of the gaming fraternity with resolution and graphical capabilities.

This frustrating feeling that their games console – a device which has historically led technology rather than falling behind it – is already outmoded will be exacerbated by the appearance of other native 4K sources in the next 12-24 months. For while as I discussed in a previous feature there are currently technical hurdles to delivering 4K in to the home (at least at the sort of astounding quality it’s capable of), by Christmas 2015 it now looks like there will at the very least be 4K streaming services from Netflix NFLX -1.01%, Amazon, and Nanotech, as well as 4K Blu-ray discs (as officially revealed last week by the Blu-ray Disc Association). There may even be a 4K broadcast or two.

In other words, 4K TV owners will soon have access to enough 4K sources to constantly highlight the lack of such quality coming from their games console.

There’s also a potential practical as well as ‘aesthetic’ problem with only gaming at 1080p on a 4K TV: input lag. I’ve covered this before in a separate article so I won’t go into detail again here. But in simple terms I’ve found that some 4K TVs take longer to render HD pictures received from gaming consoles than native 1080p TVs do, presumably because of the processing required to convert 1080p feeds to the 4K TV’s much higher resolution. Of course, wherever you’ve got any delay in pictures appearing on a TV screen, you’ve got a greater chance of, say, getting beaten to a pulp in Destiny. Ouch.

Even the makers of the Xbox One and PS4 acknowledge that 4K is a big deal. Ahead of each console’s launch last year speakers for both Microsoft and Sony were falling over themselves to try and suggest that their consoles would handle some sorts of 4K content – be it their interfaces, their streaming capabilities or even, particularly optimistically, their Blu-ray drives. But it’s all gone very quiet on this since, and it seems to me there are huge hurdles to the consoles delivering on all but the smallest of their 4K promises.

As for 4K gaming, as you might expect given the theme of this article, it’s a bust. Sony has flat-out said as much, and while Microsoft has been cagier about it – in fact, a handily unnamed Microsoft ‘representative’ even told Polygon last year that Xbox One games WOULD support native 4K – the fact that the console is struggling to run games in 1080p makes the notion of native 4K gaming on it seem laughable, frankly.

It’s argued (though I’ll believe it when I see it) that both consoles may be able to output games upsaled from HD to 4K. But even if this proves possible it’s no replacement for a true source-to-screen 4K experience.

The bottom line is that Microsoft and Sony got so caught up in the race to be first to market with a ‘next generation’ console that they failed to actually deliver a truly next generation console. Seriously, in all honesty how many of you have sat there jaw agape with amazement at what a huge step forward your PS4 or Xbox One is over its predecessor? Not many I’ll warrant. And before anyone tries to suggest that gaming is what matters, not graphics, I refer you to any gaming forum you care to mention to find out the grim pixel-based truth of the matter.

Even if Microsoft and Sony had waited just one more year before bringing their new consoles to market there’d have been at least half a chance we’d have ended up with genuine next-generation products that might have enjoyed lifespans at least in line with those of the Xbox 360 and PS3.

As it is we’re stuck with consoles that will both feel seriously underpowered by many of their users by as early as the end of next year, creating a level of frustration that both Microsoft and Sony will likely feel motivated to address with new products sooner rather than later.

At which point it’s probably best that I sign off, as I’ve suddenly started to feel a very unhelpful urge to mention that Japanese broadcaster NHK actually filmed some of the recent World Cup in Brazil in 8K…

http://www.gamersoutpost.net/

by Paul Tassi

The past few days have been a blur of gunfire, alien screams and endless, nonsense sci-fi jargon, but at last I’ve reached the soft level cap in Destiny at 20. It’s where all the best gear and hardest missions are locked away, and after you hit the marker, a different phase of the game begins.

I know a lot of people are wondering exactly what endgame content in Destiny looks like, and since I probably could not have physically played this game more the past three days, I think I can comment reasonably well on what life is like post-story mode and once you hit that level wall, based on my experience so far.

There’s some confusion about whether or not 20 is the cap, and what you’re supposed to do to further your level after that, so let me clear up a few things.

You continue earning XP once you hit twenty, only instead of hitting a new level that way, you earn “Motes of Light,” a currency that can be traded in for Legendary class gear (cosmetic only, from what I can tell). Additionally, by the time you hit 20 you will not be anywhere close to maxing out your skills with either of your class specialties. XP continues to build those up as well, and it seems as if unlocks will continue well into the future, even if your rank doesn’t increase at the same rate. Alternating between my two Hunter specialties, I think I have maybe half to two-thirds of the different perks and upgrades unlocked. And now opening up a new one takes forever.

So, how do you keep leveling? Like absolutely everything in this game, it has to do with “light.” In this case, Light is a new stat that you’ll find attached to your four swappable pieces of armor. The more light an item has, the closer it will push you to level 21, 22 and so on. I think you need 20 Light to hit 21, and rare gear starts off only giving you three or four each. Legendary gear available for sale will be giving you 18 or 19 Light each, so it clearly ramps up over time.

How do you earn this new gear? There seem to be two major ways forward. Certain legendary items can only be bought using Crucible marks, earned from playing competitive multiplayer. Others can only be bought with Vanguard marks, earned from playing Strike playlists. So whichever style of play suits you, aka co-op or competitive, you can start earning better gear that way.

But wait, things are even more complicated than they appear. You can also start earning marks and reputation points for the different factions inside the Tower, each with their own currency and types of gear. You have to buy a piece of their armor and equip it, then you start earning for them instead of the default Vanguard. I’m guessing this will fly over the heads of most players for quite a while, and I only just figured it out as I was writing this piece. Also, earned marks are capped at 100 a week, so play all the Crucible matches and Strikes you want, but it will take you at least two weeks to buy your first legendary weapon.

Additionally, you can find new gear randomly without earning marks or reputation at all just by replaying story missions on harder difficulties, or doing Patrol mode. These aren’t exactly reliable in terms of rewards, but I have gotten some good items from both from time to time (though I have never had a legendary drop in the wild yet). But more on Patrol mode in particular later.

After hitting 20, players will find themselves caught in a sort of purgatory when it comes to the endgame. The much talked about friends-only raids are still nowhere to be found, presumably locked away until you reach a much higher Light level. But gaining Light is often purely based on luck. I’ve done more than a few Strikes where my reward hasn’t gotten me a single new point of Light on my armor, so you’re at the mercy of drops and end-of-mission rewards.

The problem with this “middle end game” is that to hit 20 in the first place, you pretty much have done everything already. Each story mission, each Strike, each Patrol mode and maybe a few multiplayer games. And once you’re at the cap, you’re simply repeating all of this content, except on a more challenging setting.

Strike playlists are a good length, usually about 25-40 minutes depending on the IQ of my fireteam. But the problem is that there are only six Strikes in the game right now, and that can lead to annoying scenarios like when I was forced to play the same Strike three times in a row. Bad luck maybe, but it’s clear all of these will get a little repetitive quickly anyway. Almost every Strike is structured the same, beginning with A) random assorted enemies  then B) a respawn free zone with yellow health bar enemies and finally C) a boss fight that has you hiding behind pillars from massive weapon blasts while trying to whittle down their comically enormous health bar.

(Update: Hold on a second. Unless I have the worst luck ever, it seems Strike matchmaking is segregated by level. As in, each tier is not picking from all six Strikes. Rather, level 18 is either the moon or Earth, level 20 is only the two Venus missions while 22 is Mars. That means if you’re choosing the proper Strike playlist for your level, you’re only coinflipping between two different Strikes, which explains why I’ve played the Venus “kill the Archon before it gets its soul” one about seven times now. If you do the level 18 one, you get garbage gear, if you do 22 before you’re ready, you will get demolished. I have absolutely no idea why each of these playlists doesn’t choose randomly between all six strikes and just adjust the level accordingly. It’s like the game is going out of its way to be repetitive.)

In that sense it’s almost more appealing to re-do one of the game’s 25-odd story missions, though those don’t come with the promise of a rare item at the end, nor Vanguard marks from what I can tell. You may have a daily mission quest that gives you some of that currency, but after that, there’s little reason to do story mode.

But what I’m most disappointed about is how much Patrol mode is lacking. It’s the fastest way to level up your Vanguard rank, but it’s painfully dull and frustrating at present.

Some missions take two seconds (kill 10 enemies) and some will have you trekking across the entire length of the map for an “exploration” or “scan” mission, and then strand you in the middle of nowhere forcing you to hike miles to an area where you can get more missions. Often times it’s easier to simply return to orbit and go back down to the planet again than make the arduous journey. Also, in 20+ hours of gameplay I’ve seen exactly one world event, and I had to complete it by myself. So all there really is to do is the same four or five sub-missions on repeat.

That’s not strictly true, as there’s still good old actual “exploration” to be done as you try to crawl down every crevice in a map. But to me, this is the most frustrating aspect of Patrol mode. You know those areas where you ran across “??” high level enemies before? Well, you can go back to them now, kill everyone, and be rewarded with….nothing.

This is so odd I almost think it’s a bug. In the Cosmodrome alone, I’ve found three areas with high level enemies, and one named boss that took me probably ten minutes to kill even though he was two levels lower than me, and there was simply no reward for doing so. In another instance, I stumbled upon a tunnel formerly filled with ?? enemies, and expected some sort of elaborate secret dungeon. Instead I killed six enemies and found it simply led to another part of the map I’d already been. You get your 25 glimmer for killing a yellow health bar enemy, but I haven’t had one drop an item yet, and I’ve found no chests lurking nearby. There’s just nothing at all, and no reason to try and find these hidden alcoves of high level enemies from what I can tell. This seems like either an outright error, or an enormous missed opportunity. Or maybe I have to kill these same clusters on repeat until they finally give something up. But right now, Patrol feels like a never-ending series of dead-ends.

The problem with Destiny’s endgame content right now is that you’ve experienced all of it by the time you finish the game. As I said, I was hoping there were new, dangerous areas of each worldmap to explore, or maybe harder high level Strikes, but it’s usually the game just making old content harder.

I suppose this is why raids are looming once everyone slowly inches up their Light meter to reach higher levels. I don’t know what those will be like, but I have to imagine they’ll use the same maps and feature the same enemies, but will just be harder and longer. And even though fans are banding together to try and form raiding parties via third party websites (due to an utter lack of in-game communication), I know I’m not going to have the effort to consistently play friends-only raids. I may do one if I can coordinate with five friends or random internet strangers, but is that really going to be worth it? And if so, is that even feasible to do on a consistent basis? I can pick up a Strike any play it whenever, but a 6-man friends-only raid is going to require more coordination than I have patience.

I think Destiny’s endgame has potential, but I’m a little worried about it from what I’ve seen so far. The Strike playlist is fun, there just needs to be more of them (DLC incoming). Patrol mode needs a complete overhaul and areas that spawn dangerous enemies and actually give you a reward for killing them. The Crucible is the Crucible, and if competitive multiplayer is your thing, that’s probably the easiest overall way to consistently get new stuff.

It feels like the level 20 cap is going to confuse a lot people, as it’s not very clearly explained and I still don’t understand many aspects of it. I have three types of rare currency in my stash I have no idea what to do with, and I’m not sure how I feel about the idea of saving up marks (two more forms of currency) for Legendary gear to be bought at the Tower store. Bungie said item trading didn’t exist in the game because they wanted to ensure that you had “an epic story for each piece of gear.” I don’t really think “I played 50 Strikes to earn enough marks to buy these boots” is a terribly epic story.

Again, these are all technically just first impressions of the endgame, and I realize there’s still an end-ier game on the horizon in the form of raids. But in its current form, I think some may grow weary of the grind and cease playing Destiny earlier than Bungie and Activision want them to.

If you’ve hit 20, what do you make of the initial endgame so far? Leave your answer below.

http://www.gamersoutpost.net/

by Edward Smith

Destiny

I love Destiny. It’s somehow managed to bypass the cynical, suspicious-of-AAA, fed up with standard game design part of my brain and plug into a tiny, flickering synapse somewhere that still gets off on finding loot and collecting points. I don’t know how it’s happened – maybe it’s because, on PS4, Destiny looks incredible – but this game has got to me. I can see all of it’s little ploys in action, all that grubby meat and potatoes design, just trying to drag me in for one more hour, but I don’t care. It’s beaten me. I just want to play it.

To clarify, basically everything about Destiny goes against my personal taste. It’s a hulking great Videogame with a capital V, a corporate monolith, seemingly built with the singular purpose of getting as many people to play it for as long as possible, i.e. make a lot of money. The plot is total guff, some sci-fi fizz about prophecies and lasers, and the mechanics are straight as a die: you kill creatures, collect points, use them to upgrade your guns then kill more creatures. If I was writing a quote for some kind of anti-Destiny ad campaign I’d say it was “like Borderlands but without the jokes.” On paper, this just isn’t for me.

This is the product of people with genuine fire in their bellies

But here I am, nevertheless infatuated. When I tried the beta, I described it like a work of architecture. I said it wasn’t particularly artful, but it was clearly the product of talented, experienced game designers. I called it trade craft. I said that as by the numbers AAA launches go, Destiny was the most refined.

Now, having played the full game (or at least, 30 hours of the full game) that original assessment seems pretty reductive. Destiny is completely down the line, but that doesn’t mean it has no heart. I get the impression that the developers truly believe what they’re making is important, that they aren’t just dried up cynics, conniving new ways to squeeze a few bucks into their coffers. It’s a horrible catch-all term, but passion has definitely gone into this game. This is the product not just of game designers who are at the top of their field skills wise, but of people with genuine fire in their bellies.

It’s in everything. With a game so smoothly and flawlessly designed as Destiny, it’s easy to feel cold towards it- every function is perfectly honed, every area has been tested and re-tested until it flows perfectly. It’s easy to look at Destiny like it’s a machine, but you have to remember that getting all of these things to function so immaculately takes time, and so, so much effort. The work that has gone into Destiny can’t just have been inspired by capitalism. People have clocked in, day in, day out, for around five years in order to get this game to sing the way it does, and if that’s not passion, I don’t know what is.

Destiny is more than just mass-market appeal.

And then you have these genuinely beautiful little moments. Occasionally you’ll glance something on the horizon, like a faraway star system or the floating debris of a spaceship, and it looks amazing. Other times, the social element of the game will play out just perfectly. More than once I’ve been stranded in a gunfight, down to my last few bullets and almost dead, and suddenly another player has jumped into the arena and cleaned the bad guys out, before turning to me and giving a quick wave, as if to say “no problem.” Destiny is more than just mass-market appeal. At the best of times, it can be as evocative or personal as a game from the independent scene.

But there’s always this thick, AAA carapace sitting over the top and despite the obvious fervour on Bungie’s part, I can’t enjoy Destiny without feeling acutely self-aware. I do get swept up by the lustre on occasion, but for the most part, visually, Destiny is bland. It’s that kind of Dead Space, hack-and-slash school of enemy design where everything is a rough collection of shapes and colours, where enemies flow into one another and are really only distinguishable by how many hit points it takes to kill them. Likewise, the in-game technology, especially your wee robotic pal, Ghost, is sleek and magical. Characters just press a button and everything happens for them automatically. There’s no sense of grime or attrition. The world of Destiny, though it’s supposed to be post-apocalyptic, always runs like a well-oiled engine.

And that leaves it feeling lifeless. When I think of a really good sci-fi aesthetic, I think of Alien or Blade Runner, where everything is wet, rusted and run by computers that have actual keyboards. I understand that loosely-defined, spectral technology is freeing for gameplay designers, since it gives them a context for their wilder ideas, but it really stifles your engagement. In Destiny, I never feel like I’m fighting for my life. The support characters keep reiterating how dire the situation is, but I have so many tools and guns that I can’t imagine ever losing. When one of the early level quests is to kill 100 enemies in a row without dying, it’s hard to lose yourself in the game’s apocalyptic drama.

Destiny has one simple, unwavering solution: shoot it

The structure doesn’t help, either. Invariably, your mission is to enter some zone occupied by enemies, kill them all and collect a trinket. It’s not necessarily boring – Destiny is compulsive, in the same way you can’t stop yourself from eating an entire bag of nuts – but again, it nullifies your senses. Every problem in Destiny comes with a simple, unwavering solution: shoot it. If the game has a fatal flaw, it’s that for all the monologues and orchestral music, there’s no implicit drama. You’re never thrown a curve ball. Your guns are always the answer. Any tension is artificial, since mechanically, Destiny runs like a simple input-to-output computer.

That doesn’t diminish how much of an achievement this game is. As I’ve written already, this is real craftmanship and despite my personal leanings and better judgement, I’ve been sucked into Destiny wholeheartedly. Verily, I want to play it some more. I want to level-up my character, beat all the quests and find all the MacGuffins. I’m just not sure it’s for the right reasons. I don’t feel invested in the world or the emotional experience of Destiny so much as I feel enslaved to that part of my mind that enjoys rewards and bonuses.

By that measure, I might say Destiny has a dim-view of its players. I might say it’s cynical and deliberate, in the same way as micro-transactional, cash-spinning mobile games. But still, there’s that lustre, that perfection, that craftwork. I can’t write Destiny off as a mere money-maker because, by God, some work has gone into this game.

Scores:

Graphics: 8/10 – Superb. Even if the art design is lacking, the fact a world this big can look this good is incredible.
Gameplay: 7/10 – Slick, functional and perfectly refined, but the mission structure repeats itself and always runs contradictory to the game’s drama.
Writing: 5/10 – Again, it’s perfectly functional, but drab and convoluted. On top of that, it doesn’t fit, at all, with the game’s mechanics.
Sound: 8/10 – There are a few distinct tracks among the score and Peter Dinklage does some great voice work as Ghost. Guns are suitably loud, also.
Replay value: 10/10 – Destiny is massive. You’ll be playing this for years.

Overall: 8/10 – Ambitious, polished and clearly pored over by hundreds of people, Destiny is an incredible creative undertaking. It doesn’t all click, but it’s a huge achievement.

http://www.gamersoutpost.net/