The mechanics can be a bit rough without any prior knowledge, since the game can overload you on information. The tutorial can help, but you may find that it's easier to learn on the go, playing a few practice games is the best way to understand the mechanics. Don't be discouraged right at the start. The game is rewarding to learn, and eventually you'll find yourself managing an entire empire AND an army at the same time with a few clicks. 

Endless Legend possesses a fairly powerful non-player AI at its disposal. Past the normal difficulty the AI expands quickly, and falls into their preferred victory type quickly. You'll find that the more militant AI will expand and build armies quickly while the more political will send you compliments or peace treaties, hoping to win by forging good relations with all other players. The competent AI provides an enjoyable and challenging option for players who cannot play online or chose not to. For those who look towards the challenge of real players, you might find that online matchmaking is poor, so you may have to do a bit of searching looking for players. This is a problem all 4X games possess, the time requirement for games such as these means you cannot knock one out in an hour, games can span days or even weeks, depending on settings. Building up a friends list and setting times to play is crucial, since most evenings will end with a save to be picked up later. 

It would be remiss not to mention the flaws in the game. It contains some minor glitches and bugs, such as quests not working properly or minor crashes, but considering the quality compared to more recent releases, they are only minor inconveniences. Considering this, the overall quality far outweighs this tiny issues. The online works fantastic, and rarely do you experience crashes or internet issues that would impede gameplay. 

Easily a top 5 game of 2014, it was easy to miss Endless Legend if you don't actively monitor alphas or 4X games. But I highly recommend anyone interested in joining the 4X genre or just looking for a fresh start try out Endless Legend. The developers are still actively patching and updating the game with new content, and I see a bright future for the series. 

Before I begin, I'd like to explain that I previewed/played the Xbox One version of The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited beta. So any and all problems I found within the beta may be resolved before the game's official release date of June 9, 2015.

That being said, I found the controls to be fine. I never found myself tripping over the controller trying to remember which button does what. You still use the left stick to move, the right stick to move the camera, Left Trigger blocks, and Right attacks. Those are the controls that need to stay the same to keep the game playable, and they are the same. 

I couldn't shake the feeling of how strange the first person camera feels. It feels....wrong. Like it isn't meant to be in the game. It's clear the developers put more time and polish into the third person camera, which works well.

The graphics for ESO on Xbox One can be very pretty at times, especially far off vistas. Standing on a mountain over looking Tamriel is a good example of that. ESO definitely has the look of a Bethesda Game Studios Elders Scrolls entry. The textures are a bit of a different story though. 

If you run up to an NPC or any texture in the world too fast then you have to wait a second or two for that texture to fully load. This is especially apparent when you run up to an NPC to open up dialogue and turn in a quest. And even with the texture fully loaded it isn't as pretty as the Elder Scrolls has been before. 

Though, I suppose this is excusable considering it is an MMO with a huge world and dozens of players with you at times. If ZeniMax Online tried to implement Skyrim level graphics into a game of this magnitude then it would more than likely run very poorly. Fortunately, ESO runs rather smoothly. One thing I have to commend ESO for is that there are no load times going into major cities. Similar to Morrowind. This was minor annoyance in Oblivion and Skyrim so it is nice to see it ironed out in ESO. The load times going into buildings is near instantaneous, which on console is a rarity so it's a nice touch. 

Magic also isn't as streamlined as it was in Skyrim. Your melee attacks are interrupted to use any magic attacks which are mapped to the face buttons. I found myself not using magic attacks at all really. Strangely enough, magic doesn't seem to be as important in ESO as it was in previous entries even though the game still encourages you to play with a magic style. Though, this didn't bother me very much because I rarely use magic in Elder Scrolls games; a lot of players still enjoy playing in the Mage class, but here it feels watered down.

In there attempts of being WoW, ZeniMax Online, have watered down the Elder Scrolls experience to the point where it, sadly, feels like a generic MMO with an Elder Scrolls coat of paint. 

Some things are strangely taking out of ESO that were in previous Elder Scrolls game. Like being able to loot all bodies, not in ESO. Only certain bodies can be looted. I suppose it's to help preserve the economy of the game so players can't farm the same types of enemies for hours. Not being able to read every book is gone too. Now, you can only read "lore books" which, yes, are still nice to read if you are into the lore, but there aren't many of those. Also, how is "The Lusty Argonian Maid" in ESO when it was written by an Imperial in the Third Era? I know this sounds like I'm really nitpicking, but it just furthers my concern with how canon this game is when the developers can't even get Bethesda's original lore right. 

You can't loot every object in the world either anymore. So no more stealing goblets and plates to sell for a few gold each. Strangest yet, no more sitting down on chairs and benches. Why this was taking out? I have no idea. Why couldn't the developers go for a more original experience rather than a WoW clone? It's the Elder Scrolls. It was one of the most original games back in the day.

If you aren't an Elder Scrolls fan, this isn't going to be the game that converts you. I am, however, a huge Elder Scrolls fanboy so I can still see myself getting lost in this game for hours upon hours when it officially releases despite these flaws. But again, like I said, this was a beta so everything I just said could be completely different when the final game launches. Maybe, and hopefully, all these issues and concerns are ironed out in the final product. 

I also recorded some gameplay if you are interested in watching the beta in action:

A big thanks to ZeniMax Online Studios and Bethesda Softworks for allowing me to participate in the limited access beta of The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited for Xbox One.

After many delays since its announcement in 2013, January 28th to February 2nd, people who pre-ordered The Division (or some lucky individuals that were on a long waiting list) got access to a closed beta for The Division. As this is a beta, it is entirely possible that any and all grievances or admirations can be changed. The version of the beta I got to play was on Xbox One.

Let's get the obvious out of the way. Yes, the graphics have had a bit of a downgrading since The Division's initial reveal. This is unfortunate, but I suppose it's to be expected considering the developer/publisher. Besides this, the graphics actually were still quite impressive. The Division really benefits from having a day/night cycle and this is mostly evident during nights and early morning.

As the sun rises, sun rays pour out from between buildings and, at night, snowflakes begin to fall and even a small blizzard will sometimes roll in. Although, it's still a shame to think that the graphics could have been much better if there wasn't a downgrade.

Textures are a bit of another story. Character models are decent, and textures on clothing look good, but environment textures all look flat and dull. And, besides sun rays in the morning and headlights in blizzards, the lighting is pretty flat overall. It's as if more work was centered around one aspect of graphics than others. There also appears to be a character customization feature allowing the player to create his or her's desired face, but the beta limited this into a few default choices for male or female.

Some of you may roll your eyes when I say that The Division is a cover based shooter, and that's understandable. The cover based shooting is, admittedly, rather dull. There's a lot of cover so you can flank and get around the enemy, but all encounters are usually the same. Run up to a group of enemies, take cover, shoot, change cover, shoot, win, repeat. It's standard and doesn't do anything to reinvent the wheel of this sort of gameplay, but there is one flaw that ultimately hurts the entire side of gameplay.

You can not crouch or go prone in The Division. This is absolutely unacceptable for a game that touts itself as a more tactical focused shooter. Without crouching, stealth is no longer an option (even though you can still equip your guns with suppressors) and it's too difficult to coordinate a team that can only stand around and get shot unless they tap 'A' to take cover. Perhaps not being able to go prone is acceptable, because not all third person shooters let you do this, but not being able to crouch is not.

As well as being able to take cover, you can also climb on top of cars and other large objects to shoot down at enemies, but you'll just be standing on top of said object looking like an easy target since you can't crouch or go prone. Just don't expect the tacticality and player interaction that can be found in other Tom Clancy games like Rainbow Six and Ghost Recon.

Something that surprised me right off the bat is that guns have actually weight to them. It didn't feel like pulling the trigger on cap guns. Weapons also sounded fairly accurate as well. The Division also claims to be both an MMO and an RPG. Both of these elements are really simplified. You can team up with a small group of players, but you won't see huge groups of people like you would in other MMO's like WoW. The Division does have RPG elements. You can choose perks from three different tiers, but it's very simple. Almost to a negative point.

The Division is also loot based. Meaning that enemies will drop weapons and items. In the PVE (player vs enemy) areas, enemies won't always drop worthwhile loot. You will have to go into the PVP (player vs player) area known as "The Dark Zone" to get good loot. Inside The Dark Zone, you have a completely new level system and a brand new form of currency to use at Dark Zone vendors. The Dark Zone is actually pretty interesting. You can either choose to team up with other players to hunt down enemy NPCs and get loot from them, or you can choose to either go solo or team up to kill other players to steal their loot. The only catch is that the loot is infected with a virus so you have to call an extracting helicopter to take your loot from you whilst in The Dark Zone. You are a huge target while waiting for it.

Like previously stated, all grievances and admirations can all be changed in The Division's official release on March 8th. Yet, overall, The Division still hooked me and got me very excited to play it when it finally is released. Some things like not being able to crouch and go prone are borderline unacceptable, but here's hoping that is fixed for it's release. Let's just hope that The Division is worth the long wait from it's 2013 announcement in March 2016.

Developed by id Software and published by Bethesda, Doom is a first-person shooter with a nostalgic feel. This is the fist major installment in the Doom series since 2004 and has been anticipated by the loyal community. After playing the early access Doom beta, I thought the newly releasing game has a lot of potential but still isn't quite there. What I mean by this is that there were a lot of aspects of the game that didn't quite seem fully developed. Obviously this is a beta so the game isn't finished, but it still is a good representation of what it could look like when the game launches on May 13. Here were my initial thoughts after playing the beta for a couple hours:

Pro Features:

-Graphically looked absolutely stunning

-Movement felt very smooth and fluent

-Lots of customizable features for your character and weapons

-A brand new game that contains a nostalgic feel when playing

Possible areas of improvement:

-The guns seem VERY week and take a ridiculous amount of shots to kill an opponent

-The demon is extremely hard to kill and quite rare to obtain

-Weapon choices are very limited (most likely due to beta stage)

-Only 2 maps and 2 game mode (also most likely to to beta stage)

If you have not played the beta yet I recommend you download it and play it while it is open. The beta is open from April 15-17 and the full game launches on May 13. If you want to learn more check out my gameplay video on my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCF1BVKVnGbnZNwItlH50I2A

(Disclaimer: Any and all content that this game's beta contains may be changed or altered in its final release. Please keep this fact in consideration while reading.)

The story is wacky, but simple. A young but passionate baseball player named Sally hits a homerun so hard that the ball speeds through space and crashes into an alien planet so forcefully that it makes a crater upon impact. As such the aliens get pissed and invade earth to exact their revenge. So Sally takes it upon herself to fend off the invaders with her trusty bat and ball. It gives of that early 90's style of creativity that you don't see very much. The story doesn't make much sense, but it doesn't have to as the gameplay is what matters most. I love games like this because the surreal plot makes for some interesting mechanics due to the setting that the story gave it. Most game companies don't seem to grasp this any more.

Now as for the game's controls, they are very responsive and I can't seem to find anything wrong with them. You hit the ball into the blocks and aliens on top half of the screen, you grab power-ups that you can activate at any time to make completing the stage easier, and you can slide along the ground to temporarily become invulnerable to enemy fire. You only get three strikes (HP) before you're out though, but I think that's more than fair considering that the game's challenge scales at a natural pace and you don't fail if the ball ever touches the ground; Instead you just lose the score combo you've built up to that point. I never felt like the game was unfairly difficult in the 5 stages that the beta offered at the time.

Now while there were so few levels in the beta itself, it did offer a level editor which I tried out to a fair extent. Now while it wasn't the most intuitive level editor I've used, I never found myself frustrated on how to use it. It was very easy to learn and placing blocks and enemies was quite painless because the whole system was tile-based. Now I have no idea if sharing levels will be a feature that will be added to it any time in the future, but I sincerely hope that the developers will at least consider it.

Overall, I had a ton of fun with what little was presented to me. The music was extremely well composed and had a Sega-like feel to it, the graphics and spritework was expertly made and was vibrantly colored, and the fact that it's gamepad compatible is just icing on the cake. I was especially impressed by the fact that it was made in Unity as the sheer abundance of crappy Unity-made games makes ones like Aliens Go Home Run! shine as a result. There are a few bugs here and there but due to it still being in its testing phase, that's to be expected. I personally can't wait until the full version of this game is completely finished and released on April 2nd, but until then, I'll be seeing you.

(Disclaimer: Like before, any and all content that this game's beta contains may be changed or altered in its final release. Please keep this fact in consideration while reading.)

So first of all, what can I say that hasn't already been said? Each of the 70 stages and 9 bosses have their own unique challenge to them witch gradually increase in difficulty as you play. But I did have one major problem with one stage and one stage only: 5-7. Every regular stage before and after it were perfectly fine and a lot of fun when it came to their difficulty relative to where it was placed in the game, but this stage in particular was severely unbalanced. I get that the game is still in beta and is currently being tested for bugs, but when I'm subjected to a bullet hell while avoiding mines AND those thwomp-like enemies for nearly an hour where every other stage took roughly 5 minutes (bosses at no more than 10 minutes), it starts to feel more like a chore. The only other gripe I had with the game is that some of the achievements didn't proc when they were supposed to, but that didn't bother me too much. I've never been big on collecting achievements in games.

Now that one stage didn't ruin my experience of this wonderfully crafted game. It would take a helluva lot more than one bad stage to make me hate a video game; I'm not that petty. So like I said, my overall opinion was largely unchanged. And now that I've beaten the game, I feel that I can properly score this game like I have in every other review I've done. So until next time, I'll be seeing you.

Score