Best Console Games of 2015
2015 has seen some spectacular games for the PlayStation 4. Games that have been hotly anticipated and some games that have just taken the gamers in us all by surprise. So we take a look back at some of the best games for the PlayStation 4 and why they are what they are.
Bloodborne
Bloodborne has to be one of the best games this year hands down. A PlayStation 4 exclusive, Bloodborne was released back in March and has since then earned critical acclaim, as well as selling over 2 million copies as of September 30, making it one of the biggest selling titles ever.
Bloodborne is an incredibly detailed fantasy landscape where even a single misstep can destroy you. The storytelling is as grand as the environment it’s in, with a narrative delivered through things as subtle as the name of an enemy or the description of an item.
The game is played from a third-person perspective, players control a fully customizable protagonist, and gameplay is focused on weapons-based combat and exploration. Players battle beastly and varied enemies, including bosses, using items such as swords and firearms, and journey through the story, exploring the game’s different locations, interacting with non-player characters, collecting key items involved in the story, and discovering and unraveling the world’s many mysteries.
What critics have lauded is the game’s atmosphere, detailed environments, and the overall visuals, the interconnected world design, the design of the characters, particularly that of the enemies, the challenging, fast-paced gameplay, the storyline and lore, and the soundtrack, which some touted as “glorious”.
Yes, you do miss the Joker in this one, brilliantly voiced by Mark Hamill, but all your other voice actors are here. Kevin Conroy (voice of Batman) and John Noble (voice of Scarecrow) give a terrific performance here. The combat and predator system also gets an improvement. Finally, the world of Gotham City never looked more beautiful as it does in Arkham Knight. The city being a natural extension to the characters, deserves praise and the game overall is a fitting end to the Arkham series.
Halo 5: Guardians
Halo 5: Guardians is the fifth title in the Halo series which was released on October 27 for the Xbox One. Producer Josh Holmes stated that the game’s engine employs a “new progressive resolution system that allows us to dynamically scale the resolution at which we render the game” to guarantee it maintains a frame rate of 60 FPS.
Halo 5: Guardians takes place in the year 2558, and is set eight months after the events of Halo 4. The game follows the human fireteams Blue Team and Osiris. The game also sees returning fan-favorite Nathan Fillion as Edward Buck from Halo 3: ODST. You can spot him in the opening scene below.
Halo 5 also has one of the best arsenal in the series, thanks to returning classics and design facelifts for guns that were otherwise ignored. Old favorites like the battle rifle, Spartan laser, and trusty assault rifle look and feel great.
Halo 5 is a looker. The gameplay takes you through an eerie abandoned research station, a backwater planet ripe with odd, gorgeous life and vegetation, ruins with ancient and worn-looking monuments, and several other beautiful locations.
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
Another game that had extremely high expectations was the fifth instalment to the Metal Gear Solid franchise. The Phantom Pain serves as a sequel to Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes, and a continuation of the narrative established there, and a prequel to the original Metal Gear game.
In The Phantom Pain, players take the role of Big Boss, under the nickname Punished “Venom” Snake, in an open world environment. The gameplay elements were largely unchanged from Ground Zeroes, meaning that players will have to sneak from several points in the game world, avoiding enemy guards, and remaining undetected.
The Phantom Pain achieves sheer excellence as an espionage game. The graphics are top notch and the environment is simply spectacular. It’s a game that is deserving of the current-gen console. Check out the launch trailer of The Phantom Pain below to see how the franchise has evolved through the years.
The Phantom Pain was critically acclaimed upon release, with its gameplay drawing praise for featuring a variety of mechanics and interconnected systems which allow a high degree of player freedom in approaching objectives.
Call of Duty
We can never get tired of Call of Duty, can we? The Black Ops segment of the franchise introduced a science fiction turn in Black Ops II that features a future warfare setting with robots and futuristic technology with a separate zombie story line as well. Black Ops III, much like its predecessor, is set in a “dark, twisted future”. The game was released on November 6th on Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58Pspqx0XGs
The six-hour story is set in the not-too-distant future. Black Ops 3’s story works on “Direct Neural Interface,” or DNI for short. This technology allows humans to mentally interact with computers, weapons, and other people. What these does is introduce terrific new ways of playing a game that was beginning to fall under the ‘been there, done that’ category. For example, you can’t use enemies’ dropped weapons because they’re registered to someone else’s brain.
The game has been praised for its length and the introduction of new elements that keeps the game fresh.
