Glimpses

A Bag of Subtle Surprises Payback surprised me in a lot of ways, especially since it’s so much different from NFS: Rivals, its predecessor and also the last NFS game I played. Rivals was all about racing, and Payback is, too, but Payback offers so much more. First off, the cop – racer rivalry has been lightened up a little to make way for rivalry between the racers themselves. Next, we don’t have action tech like EMPs or shockwaves, just the old-fashioned car knockouts. Most importantly, we have a bunch of characters who actually feel like characters and who help make up a story that is much more fleshed out than Rivals. The story begins with a small racing crew of three – Tyler, Sean and Jess - who are pitted by circumstances against an influential racing faction called The House. This faction fixes races, plays dirty, has deep connections everywhere and believes in rigging the outcome in its favour by hook or by crook. The rest of the game is made up of how Tyler and co. manage t...

  Cruising on the Highway Blasting Pursuers Away A Blood Red Beauty at Night Inside a Sieve of Shadows Immediately after buying a Lamborghini Huracan. Got so excited I even forgot to hide the UI. Depths of the Canyon Await! Might as well burn bridges with speed The prized Koenigsegg Regera. Payback lets the player drive it once in a heist mission before locking it away until the end. Outta my way! A serene space in an otherwise noisy city The Beast stirs up some dirt in its wake There's light at the end of the tunnel, just go straight ahead The Huracan takes a tumble Drifting past the casino Another great capture ruined by my excitement Way to crash a Lambo! Where's the fire? Thrusters fired with full capacity An empty road and some sun - perfect day to race Road signs matter little to rebellious racers Killer decals right there Royal blue for a royal ride Waiting for the crane... Another cop car ready for the junkyard I see you on my tail Flying around in the construction yard...

 [Originally written on 22nd Sep 2019] I just finished playing HP Deathly Hallows Part 2, having completed the part 1 yesterday.   When I started Part 1, I was straightaway disappointed because the game threw a few missions at me that felt less related to the story and more like they were included just to make it lengthier. Then there was repetition – a fair amount of it. For instance, Harry had to rescue a bunch of muggle-borns from the snatchers. This involved fighting the enemy and liberating the muggle-borns from the evil enchantments. The same theme is repeated in various locations, giving the developers some sort of reprieve whilst increasing the game length. They succeeded, although sacrificing the game’s excitement. It started off quite well, though, with Bill and Fleur’s wedding, Shaftesbury Avenue and then to Grimmauld Place. Up until then it was fairly enjoyable, but as I progressed, I began facing issues. To begin with there were these side missions to be com...

 [Originally written on 27th Sep 2019] Mirror’s Edge is a free-running, parkour-based, action adventure game developed by EA Dice. Since the day I discovered Parkour, I was in desperate need of a game that was primarily based on parkour, instead of just having elements inspired from it (like Prince of Persia or Assassin’s Creed). I got such a game in the form of Vector for Android. That is another gem of a game with its silhouettes performing fluidic parkour tricks to escape a policeman of a dystopian world. But as good as it is, it’s a 2D game. What if I could actually experience how it felt to scale rooftops, jump daredevil distances and run on walls from a first-person perspective? The first search result that was returned for a “3D PC parkour game” was Mirror’s Edge. Some screenshots and gameplay videos later, I was already a fan. I wanted this game. Badly. Now that I’ve finished it, I can say that the parkour lover in me is satisfied. The game does best what it’s made ...