The Evil Within – Insanely Good

You didn’t even click on this article. Last thing you know, you were on Twitter. But there’s no Twitter tab open, and no back button. You look up at your browser and the menu has frozen. Discord won’t open. You look away from the screen, and the door in your room has disappeared. There’s nowhere to go, nothing else to look at. The only thing you can do is read this.

The Evil Within is a horror game that creates strong feelings of fear and despair. It bends reality and breaks the rules of logic with its environments and gameplay. Walls disappear, enemies morph, traps await. You don’t know how you got here, or how to get out. All you can do is adapt and stay as sane as possible through all the crazy.

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Forza Horizon 2 – Private Playground

Don’t tell anyone, but Forza Horizon 2 is still open. You won’t find it on the Xbox Store anymore, but the disc still works. Once installed with a light 2GB patch, you’ll find yourself in a delisted wonderland. Why is it delisted? Playground Games have moved onto Forza Horizon 3 and 4 and I guess Microsoft want you to buy those instead. It could also be licensing issues with the soundtrack, a fate that buried the Tony Hawk classics and threatens the longevity and relevance of GTA games. Here we are though, in Europe. This is the setting of Forza Horizon 2 and it’s absolutely beautiful.

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Brain Training for Nintendo Switch – Staying 20 in 2020

It’s nice to see you again, Dr Kawashima. This must be the first time I’ve ever been excited to see a doctor. Brain Training is back, the game that elevated Nintendo DS into the stratosphere outside traditional gaming. This “non-game” took off as a great way to use the touch screen and features of the DS and 3DS systems, but how does it hold up on a home console hybrid? It’s a little different. I picked up the new Switch version today and thought I’d write about the experience.

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Bury me, my Love – Phone in Hand

Bury me, my Love sounds like a psychotic murder mystery at first, but it’s full of heart. This is a common saying used in some countries when your loved one goes on a trip they might not come back from. Whether it’s an unstable country, a warzone, or the game awards, it’s said with much love and confidence that they will be fine. It means you will be the one to bury me, not the other way around. So you’re saying their journey will be very safe. It’s beautiful. You die first… no you die first… no you! This game gives a great look into the life of a couple who want to escape a dangerous home in Syria and start a new life.

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Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice – Psychosis Simulator

Is this really worth writing about- you didn’t enjoy it- you liked it- you don’t know if you liked it- you can’t write- you should write- this game might be misunderstood- you can do it- every experience is different- the game isn’t worth it- the game is worth it- at least it’s interesting- don’t hit that submit button there’s no going back.

These are my friends from Hellblade who stayed in my head. This game has a very large emphasis on sound design, as everything you do is narrated by dozens of tiny voices whispering at you constantly throughout the game. It’s made to imitate the feeling of psychosis and mental illness and warns you of its heavy themes before you start the game. Senua’s Sacrifice is a very personal journey where you explore very detailed environments and the dark corners of your mind.

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Pietriots Radio – Episode 5 (The Game Awards)

It’s been abandoned and haunted for a few years, but we are BACK in the Pie Studio with an all new episode of Pie Radio! Join Grubdog, Bill, Deguello, Matto, Pro Daisy and Roland as we discuss the recent Game Awards show, talk about the announcements and discuss our very own favourite games of 2019. Special guest Denis76686846 calls into the studio with even further insight!

download link (some browsers might struggle playing the file because it’s so long)

0.00 to 1:05 – Game Announcements discussion (Xbox Series X, new trailers, Godfall, Bravely Default 2)

1:05 to 1:08 – ???

1:10 to 1:43 – Game Awards discussion

1:43 to end – Pietriots Games of the Year

Thank you for listening! Please let us know if you enjoyed it and we’ll keep making them.

Resident Evil 2 – Raccoon City Limits

Gotta get to the Police Station. There’s so many of these things… what the hell happened here? Bang! … Bang bang bang! Damn these things are strong. I gotta be more careful. 4 bullets left? Dozens more of them. Can I do this? I gotta be fast but also not get grabbed. Phew that was close. One bullet in this one will slow it down, I can make the gap. I can make it. I’m gonna make it.

Welcome to Resident Evil 2 where killing every enemy is not always an option. This is survival horror gameplay at its best.

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The Touryst – Fynding Your Way

Welcome to paradise. You’ve just arrived here on a boat with nothing. No money, no suitcase, no directions and a boat driver who doesn’t know the area. You also have no recollection of your place in the world or a backstory. This is a small island with 2 houses, a shop and a mysterious looking temple, with nothing on the horizon. What’s a tourist to do?

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Pokemon Sword & Shield – Escaping The Noise

When I was a kid playing Pokemon Blue I would dream of a world where you could see Pokemon out in the wild. They’d run around and you could chase after them or just watch them play and be themselves. The ultimate Pokemon game would be so interactive, fun, mysterious and exciting, and look beautiful. It would carry all the great design strengths of the main Pokemon series, and even offer new Pokemon itself in a new land. The ultimate Pokemon game. Back then people dreamed about what the first console Pokemon would be like. Now developers Game Freak have been dragged kicking and screaming to a powerful piece of hardware, finally, and what do we have? The ultimate Pokemon game? Could we finally be at that point? With the amount of fun I’m having right now with Pokemon Shield, I’m going to say yes. They did it. I don’t believe a perfect game will (or should) ever exist, but I believe this could be the best Pokemon game yet.

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Ring Fit Adventure – Better Than Real Life

You planned on going for a jog today, but… it’s just not a good morning, is it? You’ve just woken up and it feels like a terrible idea. It’s hot, there’s smog in the air, people outside, lots of traffic and commotion. You might bump into people on their way to work or school. You might step in something. You might have to cross several roads and jog on the spot awkwardly in front of traffic. Birds could poop on your head. Car horns are going off, lights are flashing. You’re not going anywhere this morning… but what if there was still a way? Maybe tomorrow.

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Borderlands 3 – Keeping Up With The Calypsos

After seven years of DLC and side-stories for Borderlands 2, the third game is finally here. I’ve jumped into it over the past week and have been enjoying some vault hunting on brand new planets. The story is new, environments are new, there’s a million new guns, and the vault hunters themselves have brand new skills. So, what else is new? I keep hearing people say it’s just “more Borderlands” as if to downplay this game. Of course it’s more Borderlands, the title of the game is Borderlands 3. It’s not inaccurate, just a lazy way to describe it. Borderlands 3 is purposefully designed as a sequel and does a pretty good job improving the core gameplay while offering a new scenario. I’m currently level 20 and will go a bit more in depth about what’s new.

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Luigi’s Mansion 3 – PAX Aus Demo Impressions

OooooOooOoo! Do you dare enter the house of horrors? After a 20 minute wait in line, I got to play the spookiest game at PAX Aus. The booth was very dark and had about 8 Switches, with glowing ghosts around the wall. They put a lot of effort into the presentation for this game, it was definitely the most interesting place in the Nintendo booth. The line for Pokemon Sword and Shield was longer, but they just had generic setups there. This experience had atmosphere similar to if you were playing on the couch in the dark at home.

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Borderlands 2 – The Vault Hunter’s Guide to the DLC

I’ve been playing a lot of Borderlands 2 over the past few months and completed the whole regular campaign again in The Handsome Collection (named after evil protagonist Jack Handsome). I love the game and had a great time but didn’t think it was really worth a writeup alone, because it’s pretty much what you’d expect. The same game from 2013 but with retouched HD graphics at 60fps. A loot-based shooter with a post-apocalyptic setting, some dark humour and lots of bandits, gunfights, looting and exploring. It’s a very good game and a joy to replay, but many people have been there and done that. After getting The Handsome Collection however, it comes with all the DLC I had never played before. I was surprised and delighted to find this content was even more fun than the main game.

It can all be a bit overwhelming however, with dozens of places you can fast-travel to as soon as you find a fast-travel station in the first hour of the game. Having now played every single bit of content in this game, I thought I’d dissect the DLC a bit here and try and help anyone who doesn’t know where or why to start.

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GRID Autosport – Switching Gears

Racing simulators have quite the history of avoiding Nintendo consoles entirely. The last really good one I remember playing is F1 2009 on the Wii, ten years ago. Since then I’ve just got my racing fix from other consoles, with their analog triggers and in-house games like Forza offering a very solid driving simulation experience. Suddenly out of nowhere, a port of GRID Autosport has landed on the Switch eShop. I was a little cautious at first, as racing developers have treated Nintendo consoles with the bare minimum apathy in the past. Anyone remember Project CARS on Wii U? Exactly. However here we are in 2019 with the Switch kicking arse and taking names, and GRID Autosport is the real deal.

To say this game delivered what I wanted would be an understatement, it vastly exceeded expectations. Feral Interactive have not just ported the game, but upgraded it in every way imaginable, with a higher resolution and framerate than the original game, and controls and graphics optimised for both docked and handheld mode. This game is quite simply the best racing simulator to ever grace a Nintendo console, and by extension, the best one ever to grace a handheld. It’s an absolute miracle.

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Astral Chain – Odd Jobs (Walking the Beat)

Hi. My name’s Grubdog, but you can call me Grub. As everyone knows, redshift matter is threatening to end civilisation and monsters known as chimeras are ravaging Earth. It’s an important issue but someone still has to do the everyday things. We have built a nice little place here on the Ark and I’m gonna make sure it stays that way.

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