Spiderman

Marvels Spider-Man on PS4

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Insomniac’s Marvels Spider-Man was shown off at E3 this year and it impressed the E3 crowd and those watching at home a like. Spiderman is an action and adventure open world game exclusive to PS4. The gameplay trailer that was shown off this year did not disappoint. It looks just like a movie and the devs over at Insomniac have done a wonderful job of seamlessly transitioning between gameplay and cutscenes.

Also revealed was a whole host of villains that Spidey will be taking on too! Villains include Electro, Rhino, Scorpion and Vulture. Consequently, all of whom escape from the maximum security prison that we see in the trailer above. Hype has been huge for this game and for all the right reasons too! Consequently it’s shaping up to be a heavy hitter when it releases on 7th September 2018 as an exclusive title for PS4. (The Verge)

In the video above we see Ryan Penagos, Vice President & Creative Executive, Marvel New Media and rapper Styles P on a super quick look at Marvels Spider-Man for the PS4. Boy does it look good! Everyone loves Spiderman and we’ve not seen an open world superhero game before, if it’s anything like Spidey. Consequently, cover us interested! So show us more! Styles P beat up a few baddies and went on a car chase, he was definitely enjoying the game! If it can make a rapper this hyped about a video game, it is definitely worth checking out!

Game Information

Marvel’s: Spider-Man is an upcoming open world action-adventure video game based on the Marvel Comics superhero Spider-Man. It is being developed by Insomniac Games and is to be published by Sony Interactive Entertainment for the PlayStation 4 console. It will be the first licensed game developed by Insomniac. The game will tell a new story about Spider-Man and is not tied to a film or comic book. The game will cover both the Peter Parker and Spider-Man aspects of the character and will feature a more experienced Spider-Man.

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Streets of Rage 4

Streets of Rage 4 on the way?!

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An How To Kill An Hour favourite, Streets of Rage is coming back, better than ever! (We do love ourselves Streets of Rage. Check out our Raging Justice play through here!)

Streets of Rage 4 is on the way courtesy of Dotemu and Lizardcube in partnership with Sega.  Developers of Streets Of Fury, which was released in 2015 which used digitized graphics, Guard Crush Games will also have a hands on involvement in the game.

Plot

Fans of the game will be well aware of the characters that users will be utilising.  You will take on Axel and Blaze in ” “an entirely original arcade-style romp”, which will of course feature the same gameplay that you’re used to.

However, there will be new fighting mechanics and an original story. It’s a direct sequel to 1994’s Streets of Rage 3 and will feature some hand drawn visuals. Which is different to many games out there and we’re definitely looking forward to seeing it in action!

History Lesson

Sega’s hugely successful Streets of Rage franchise started life in 1991 on the Sega Genesis. It was then followed up by a duo of sequels in 1992 and ’94. It was mainly popular for it’s infections game mechanics and Yuzo Koshiro’s music!

However what consoles that Streets of Rage 4 would be coming to was not announced. Nor was a release date. We’ll keep an eye out for it!

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Strange Brigade

Strange Brigade: Exclusive Play Through

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Strange Brigade: Play Through

We’ve given Strange Brigade a play through and one thing that we will say afterwards is: Fun! This game is fun, fun, fuuuuun!! It’s very enjoyable by yourself defeating hordes of the undead. However, get a crew together and this levels of excitement and enjoyment go through the roof!

From the very start Strange Brigade is very charming with it’s friendly narrator (with his over the top British upper class dialect) and it’s 1930’s setting. The graphics draw you in to a world that is full of might magic and mystery. Yet at the same time having an underlying notion of danger when the undead appear. You know you’re in danger! Yet the locations are so pretty!

What makes Strange Brigade different to many other co-op games available today is that the levels and the game will change slightly depending on the numbers in your team. More enemies, lots of twists and turns with the levels and even the puzzles take it up a notch if you have a friend with you. Depending on who you have in your team, the chests that are scattered around the levels are there to help you. You can either share them out amongst yourselves. Or if you have a slightly unhelpful teammate (as we saw in our playthrough!) it can be a little competition to get the loot first. However we will say defeating the undead is a lot easier if you work together! Don’t horde the loot!

Characters

There are a range of characters to choose from, whilst the weapons stay the same no matter who you choose. It’s the taking of souls within the amulet where the separation between each of them is apparent. The game focuses heavily on the ‘amulet’ the small device that collects souls from the undead. Each character has their own special ability with how they utilise the amulet and the souls that they harvest. We found it a lot of fun cycling through the characters and witnessing the abilities for ourselves. We suggest you do the same, it would be such a shame to spoil it for you here!

Levels

There are a total of 9 levels to complete, each with their own areas to unlock via collection of coins. Though some will also require your brain to unlock via puzzles! Making for quite the exciting experience.  Plus the levels are interactive too, shoot various things to help defeat enemies. Shoot ropes to knock down blocks or shoot orbs to bring up a huge saw!

Horde Mode

Horde mode is also incredible amounts of fun, simply see how long you can last as a character taking on streams of enemies. The difficulty gets harder and harder as you progress so make sure you utilise the environment and collect those souls!

 

What is Strange Brigade?

Strange Brigade is your next favourite game! That’s what it is!

Strange Brigade takes users to places that they have never been before. The Plot? Well, simply there are four remote corners of the British Empire. What these remote corners entails no one knows as the shadows linger at their deepest. Who knows about these places the best? The servants of The Crown do and there are some supernatural beings that exist in these places!

Therefore it’s time to introduce the Strange Brigade! It is here where users are taken on an exotic safari, it’s dangerous and few dare to even embark on such an adventure. Why? As few return! As you go along this treacherous safari, you encounter civilisations that have once been forgotten by society, yet they’re fantastic within their own right, all while being shrouded in mystery! Go on adventures that take you to dark tombs and battle unimaginable evil!

Strange Brigade: Plot

You take on one of four adventurers or explorers. Each of the characters available to you have their own special powers, weapons and even tactics! The campaign takes you across a 1930’s era landscape and play with up to 4 friends along this action packed safari! However, as with many exotic plots, be aware of fighting armies of mythological characters that have been unleashed by an ancient Egyptian ruler: Seteki The Witch Queen. She’s so evil she has been wiped from hieroglyphs! So beware! To help you along the way there are secret caves around the safari. Why are these so special? Well within these caves there’s buried riches. Find these to help you along the way!

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Cyberpunk 2077 Gameplay

Cyberpunk 2077 Gameplay

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Cyberpunk 2077 Gameplay

Our friends over at IGN got a chance to check out Cyberpunk 2077 recently and they shared some Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay on their YouTube channel. Boy oh boy does it look good! (Though bare in mind that the footage you are seeing is from a work in progress game so all is subject t0 change. That being said it gets us excited for the release of this truly beautiful game! Bare in mind though that this game will most likely be an 18+. So the footage above is going to be very violent, use swear words,  nudity and show a lot of gore! Even though this is pre-release the graphics are clean, sharp and beautiful, which is ironic considering the scenery.

Gameplay Features

Cyberpunk 2077 is a first person RPG and we got a glimpse into how this will be incorporated in to the game. It’s CD Projekt Red’s level of detail that impressed us from the offset. Even when creating a character, the choices you make upon creation of their backstory will affect how the story will unfold going forward. IGN’s Cyberpunk 2077 gameplay shows the team take the role of a female character on her quest to find a missing person. Viewing the 48minute gameplay demo highlighted how fluid the cutscenes to gameplay is, making it feel somewhat like a movie.

The story seems very intriguing to us and we felt really immersed and we were only watching! Tasks are displayed in the top right hand corner which is very handy and easy to follow. Whilst there is no multiplayer revealed for Cyberpunk 2077, this looks like one stellar single player experience!

 

More Info

Developer CD Projekt Red describe Cyberpunk 2077 as an ““an open world, narrative-driven role-playing game” so essentially this game, as beautiful as it looks, is a first person role playing game. A first person role playing game that is also open world and narrative driven. We are liking the sound of this already! Fallout fans listen up! As even though the game is in first person, the game is said to offer players, plenty of chances to see what your character looks like. Consequently IGN pointing out that the game is a First Person RPG and not an FPS. While this is an action game, don’t expect lots of bang bang action 24/7.

Furthermore we are liking the route that this game is taking, making sure to emphasise the fact that it’s not just a shooter and it seems like there is a HUGE focus on storytelling. That’s what we got from the trailer, the trailer looked very movie like and we cannot wait to get our hands on it!

Plot

Users are playing as “V”, who is a “hired gun on the rise” within the Cyberpunk violent metropolis, Night City. Judging from the trailer we are getting a Matrix/Ready Player One vibe to the game. Going more indepth on the character customization, CD Projekt Red promises a “robust character creator” which will allow platers to choose things such as gender, appearance class and even their characters backgrounds. However, choose wisely as the choices that you make now, will affect and influence how the game plays out.

Yet much like regular RPG’s players are encouraged to interact with the various residents of Night City. Users do this via a dialogue system, which in turn will navigate the Cyberpunk 2077 narrative. With CD Prokekt Red stating that “difficult decisions will ripple through the entire game” (Polygon)

Listen to Marcus and Julia discussing this on the show by clicking here!

So, why not pre-order Cyberpunk 2077 by clicking here!

Also covered this game in one of our E3 specials listen it by clicking here!

Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate

Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate

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Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate: Defeat Monsters on the move!

Monster Hunter is one of Capcom’s biggest selling franchises to date recently reaching the heights of 10million copies of Monster Hunter games being sold world wide. Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate continues this trend on the switch. It’s Monster Hunter. But on the Switch. So expect big monsters on your small Switch. However, don’t fret, as with all Monster Hunter games you’ll have so much fun hunting down these terrible, gruesome monsters!

Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate is an updated version of it’s 3DS title of the same name (minus the Ultimate). Yet it’s still just as exciting as it first was on the 3DS. Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate has added better graphics (obviously!) the control scheme and added a bunch new monsters! 20 more to be exact, bringing the total for you to defeat to 93! NINETY THREE! That’s going to take a lot of hours to kill to defeat those!

Gameplay

Gameplay, like with most Monster Hunter Games is simple yet addictive. Find a Monster. Kill it. Then use the materials gathered from said Monster to harvest a bigger and better inventory. Such as upgrading weapons and the armour. Consequently this will help to kill a bigger and badder monster. Thus repeat cycle until you become the best monster hunters in the land. Complete a range of quests that are given to you by a village elder, though there is no explicit time limit to do them in. You are going to be pretty busy preying on some pretty huge bogeys to be fair. (Though we think the fighting of monsters is a lot more fun! Especially with friends!)

It can take a lot of time and effort to defeat a range of monsters in the single player mode. So there is an option to play with friends. Joining a multiplayer game is very easy just search the available hubs and join on to take on monsters in a crew! The most annoying part of Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate is that there is no way to chat to the people you play with. Though this is a Switch problem and not Capcom’s. Why Nintendo? WHY?! Despite this, as expected it’s a lot fun!

Overall Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate is a very enjoyable experience, which you will not be disappointed with!

Purchase Monster Hunter Generations by clicking here!

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tv streaming

Tv Streaming Boost!

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This story is more US centric than most of the ones we feature here on How To Kill An Hour but it is a good insight into how people are consuming their Tv these days. It seems like a lot of people are turning to Tv streaming over traditional methods. There’s a lot more households whom are choosing to stream their favorite shows instead of watching them on cable. (US version of Sky)

Climbing Numbers

Comscore have released a new set of data that states that the number of people opting for Tv streaming in the United States has spiked by 58% to 4.9million people. 4.9 million people is a total of 5% of all US households that stream over Wi-Fi without traditional Tv’s headaches of ads and schedules.

Comscore looked at “pure play” systems that don’t offer their own original shows the same way that services like Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime do. Pure Players are things like Sling, DirectTv Now, Playstation Vue and YouTube Tv. A full 10% of streaming time across the US came from these services this past April. A 53% spike from the previous year.

According to analysts it’s not just the young who are using these streaming services. Older viewers are signing up in droves too! Only 21% of households using these services have a head under 35. An 8% drop according to Comscore.

If a household does have these services, Comscore adds that they’ll spend nearly half their time streaming programming from it. This past April each of those households streamed a total of 128hrs of content on average. Equal to on demand services like Netflix.

Overall the users using Tv streaming services spent twice as much time with those services when compared to those watching normal Tv.

(Verge)

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Netflix ads

Netflix Promos (Ads?)

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So Netflix Ads may be on their way! It seems that way anyway. For a while now Netflix have been playing trailers before and after some of their content. While some of these can be deemed promos, some of us may call them ads. Yet, those trailers have been skippable. While Gizmodo are reporting that they don’t show up that often. They’re reporting that if the latest round of testing gets approved the ads are going to be more noticeable.

Reports on Reddit are claiming that Netflix are indeed testing a new way of delivering ads to viewers. For example short trailers for Netflix Originals being shown between episodes. Are these Netflix ads or are they promos? It may be a bit harsh to call them ads. While we can see the benefit behind them. What’s better than seeing more top quality content that we wouldn’t have known existed otherwise?

Testing

Netflix confirmed the testing phase to Ars Technica:

“We are testing whether surfacing recommendations between episodes helps members discover stories they will enjoy faster.”

However, despite this Reddit users are claiming that the ads cannot be skipped. Netflix denied these claims and confirmed that they are entirely skippable. While the streaming giant also stressed that the ads are only for Netflix content and won’t open up third party ads. Makes sense seeing that Netflix is the place that people go to to get away from traditional content. Would be bad business if Netflix were to advertise things other than their own content.

Furthermore it’s not entirely clear how many people are seeing these ads, nor how long it will last, or if it will see the light of day for the rest of us. It does seem how much people engage with the ads to whether or not they get implemented. Therefore the more people clicking on these Netflix ads, the more likely it will be rolled out officially.

If you do see the ads, or if you don’t want to be apart of any new testing features that Netflix rolls out. You can opt out by heading over to this page.

(Gizmodo)

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uefa champions league

Uefa Champions League Facebook Streaming!

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Facebook the social media giant are making giant moves in the video world. Facebook already have secured the rights to stream 2019/20 Premier League season of football in Asia in a £200M deal which was secured in July. This is leading on from Facebook’s previous foray into sports streaming. They’ve already live streamed MLS and La Liga matched previously. Consequently they are making more moves into making them more than just a social media giant. Facebook have secured the rights to stream the Uefa Champions League for free between 2018 and 2021.

While this sounds great and is a wonderful move in the right direction for the company, there is some limits. While this is groundbreaking Facebook will only broadcast 32 games per season. Yet the social media giant will share highlights and magazine programming each week.

Football fans in Latin America were able to view the UEFA Super Cup on August 15th and it will also include future Super Cups alongside the finals. Furthermore this deal will give Facebook Free-To-Air exclusivity, so you’ll need to pay for a TV service or similar to view. If you don’t have Facebook that is.

Facebook hired Eurosport chief Peter Hutton for this very reason, even if the deal isn’t as great as it looks on the outset. Yet it’s a step in the right direction. Facebook have successfully streamed live sports in the past and deals like this one prove that. Who would’ve thought you could watch sport on Facebook just 2-3 years ago. (Engadget)

Who knows, we may be seeing Premier League games or Uefa Champions League games in the UK on Facebook in the near future!?

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PLANET ALPHA

Planet Alpha: Team17’s 100th Game!

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PLANET ALPHA launches next month and it will mark Team17’s 100th game release!

Team17 are an incredible games label and they’ve teamed up with Denmark based independent developer Adrian Lazar of Planet Alpha ApS game studio to create a truly wonderful and beautiful game in PLANET ALPHA. Consequently, Team17 are incredibly proud of the work that’s gone into this game so much that they’re marking their landmark 100th game release with it!

Team17 began as a publisher when it was founded in 1990. Working on games such as Housemarque on Super Stardust and Epic on Silverball. However what made Team17 famous in the gaming industry is their work with the Worms series which launched in 1995. Consequently in 2013 Team17 set up their games label and brought to the masses games such as The Escapists, an How To Kill An Hour favourite Overcooked and Yooka-Laylee. Now 27 years on Team17 are shortly releasing (Sept 4th) PLANET ALPHA on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch™ and PC. 

Plot

PLANET ALPHA is an atmospheric side-scrolling platform adventure game. Combining fast platforming, creative puzzles, stealth mechanics and a unique art style to create an unforgettable experience.

“The 100th game marks an incredible milestone for Team17 as we move closer towards our 30th year in this diverse and creative industry. Team17 started life as an indie publisher in 1990; the release of PLANET ALPHA in 2018 is a poignant moment for us all in that we have come full circle in bringing our expertise, perspective and values from our time as an independent developer to games publishing in this exciting modern era of indie games…..I’d like to pay tribute to employees of Team17, both past and present, as we celebrate the release of a multitude of titles across many game systems from 16-bit and beyond and in countries far and wide. I’m appreciative, humbled and honoured to work with talented developers in bringing their wonderful creations to fans everywhere. We’re just as passionate and excited for the next 100 games!”  Debbie Bestwick MBE, CEO of Team17.

 

So, check out our PLANET ALPHA gameplay video from E3 below:

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Check out our exclusive play through when we got our hands on it here!

 

Detroit Become Human

Detroit Become Human

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Developed by Quantic Dream, the gaming heavyweights that are responsible for games such as Heavy Rain and Beyond:Two Souls. Detroit Become Human follows the same feature premise as Heavy Rain, a movie like game.

Players navigate around a futuristic world where you follow the lives of three androids, Kara, Conor and Markus. Kara has just escaped the owner that she was serving, her new mission in life is to protect a young girl that she encounters. Conor’s mission is to hunt down sentient androids. While Markus is devoted to releasing other androids from servitude. It is your role to follow these androids and their fate is dependant upon what dialogue you choose to shape the story.  If a character dies, you take control of another character, as the story evolves further, so therefore there is no traditional ‘game over’ in this game. (Wiki)

Plot: Detroit Become Human

Enter the near-future metropolis of Detroit in 2038 – a city rejuvenated by the introduction of highly advanced androids that exist only to serve mankind. But that’s all about to change…

Step into the shoes of three distinct android characters as this brave new world teeters on the brink of chaos. Your decisions dramatically alter how the game’s intense, branching narrative plays out. With thousands of choices and dozens of endings, how will you affect the future of Detroit? (Amazon)

So, listen to Marcus and Julia chatting about this on the show by clicking here!

You can purchase Detroit Become Human by clicking here!