Xervantes at Gamescom-day 2

On my second day I got to play some more games. I didn't get to play all the games I wanted to because of the sometimes insane long waiting lines.

Our favorite list

On our first day we put together a list of our favorite games, we had already played Dragonball Z fighter and Cuphead and now it was time to stand in line for the rest of the games.

Dragonball Z fighter
Cuphead
Assassin's Creed Origins
Monster Hunter World
Mario Odyssey
Fifa 18
PES 2018
Battlefront 2
Hidden Agenda
Biomutant

The waiting game

Battlefront and Mario Odyssey were first on our lists.
So we headed to the EA area firs.

EA put together quite a show, there were X-wing fighters, TIE fighters and Stormtroopers walking around

Cool looking Star Wars props

The waiting area for Battlefront 2

When we arrived at the waiting line we got our first disappointment, the waiting time for Battlefront 2 was 5 hours!. We quickly decided to head to the Nintendo area and try our luck there.
While walking to the next hall we passed another interesting game area.

I didn't know this game but my friend had played it before

We decided to take the plunge and wait in line for Ni No Kuni II, a nice looking RPG. We were pleasantly surprised about this game. It has you controlling a female character (I don't know much about the background) and fighting various baddies. It is an RPG with real-time battles which makes for a very good combination. You have long range attacks to your disposal and with R2 (right trigger) in combination with the standard buttons, you can unleash 4 devastating special attacks.
The game played very smooth and although they used real-time battles instead of turn based all other RPG elements were still in place.
The game is very easy to control and the graphics are very colorful.
We got to play for about 15 minutes but our unanimous conclusion was that this is a great game, definitely worth checking out even if you are not really into RPG's.

Ni no Kuni 2, a pleasant surprise

Not everything goes according to plan

Our next stop was the Nintendo area where we were again confronted with an insane waiting line for Mario Odyssey and also Monster Hunter World.
So instead of these games I convinced the others to go and try out Hidden Agenda, a game I am personally looking forward to.

More on Hidden Agenda in one of my previous posts.

We got to play two scenes, Sony had set up comfortable couches and Sony smartphones with the playlink app were available so that you could immediately start playing.

We played with our 3 man team. Playing the game is quite simple, it is basically an interactive movie where you constantly have to decide as a group which action the character in the game should take. For example our first scene involved two officers investigating a disturbance at a house. The first question asked was whether to go to the front or the back. Everyone can vote on a choice and the most votes decides the outcome. There are two important factors though. Every player gets 3 cards which can be used to over rule the other votes. So if the other players decide on something you don't agree with, you can use this card to overrule them. Also at the beginning you have to choose which player is coolest under pressure. This player gets to decide which course of action should be taken in case of a tie.

There is also the "Hidden Agenda" factor, one player gets a hidden agenda pushed to his smartphone, the other players have to guess who has the hidden agenda. You don't know what the hidden agenda is and what the player with the hidden agenda is supposed to do.
Now this is where the game really shines. Suddenly everybody and every action is suspicious. You start to question each other. One of my friends suspected me of having the hidden agenda and started to act like he had the hidden agenda just to throw off the other players.

From what I have seen from this game SuperMassive is delivering on what they promised and Hidden Agenda is going to be a very interesting game indeed.

What's next

My friends decided to take PES 2018 for a quick spin. While they were playing I watched a show by Ubisoft before heading to our next game, Assassin's Creed Origins.

Now first off, I am a big AC fan. I especially love the Black Flag and Rogue games. When I heard that the team behind Black Flag were behind Origins and that the setting was Egypt I was really excited.

But

I know that the version we got to play on the Xbox one was an Alpha and that with an Alpha things can get glitchy but because the game is set for an October release I imagined that the basics should be finished and bug free at least (especially on a Console). This was not the case however.

There was an Ubisoft lady hovering around us while we played, at first I thought that this was to keep an eye on how long we played, however now I understand the real purpose. It was to intervene when the game glitched.

The game started of with your character in the desert. You had to mount your horse and make your way to a nearby village (standard AC stuff). While riding to the village my character and horse suddenly froze for no apparent reason. The Ubisoft lady quickly approached, ready to reset the Xbox but before she could the game continued.

I made my way to the village and got an assignment to find some gold on nearby ships and kill some targets (again your basic AC antics).
Being the AC veteran that I am, I dove into the water and swam to one of the ships.

The controls for AC Origins have changed, it is now more of a Dark Souls control scheme where the shoulder buttons and triggers are the action buttons. Also new is the fact that you can control an eagle as your eyes in the sky.

while I was in the water I switched over to the eagle to scout the ships and find the gold and my target. Controlling the eagle was no fun it felt unresponsive and glitchy.
After I found the gold and my target I switched back to the main character and swam to the ship where the gold and my target were located.

I climbed the side of the ship and made my way in AC fashion to the gold, after obtaining the gold, I approached my target from back ready to kill him in a AC fashion. I pushed the kill button and....NOTHING
I pushed the button again and again but nothing happened.
I was just about to call the Ubisoft lady when suddenly my target collapsed into a heap almost 10 seconds after I had tried to assassinate him.

Playing the Alpha has me very concerned for AC origins. Ubisoft has 2 months to get things right but at this moment even the basics are not properly up-and-running yet. I hope the get things in order before the launch but my opinion is that things are not looking good.

After the dissapoinment of Assassin's Creed Origins we decided to go back to our favorite game of Gamescom, Dragonball Z fighter.