Microsoft to give $100 in credit for your PS3 trade-in towards an xbox one

From now until March 3, Microsoft is offering $100 credit to people who bring in their PS3s into the Microsoft Store when you purchase an xbox one.

I'm not saying this is a good deal by any stretch, but if you have a dusty PS3 that's not getting any use, you could consider bring it in to Microsoft to grab your xbone. Or you could just hold on to it and buy a PS4 for the same post discount price and have access to a 2nd great bluray player.

DayZ: Postapocalyptic role play extravaganza

I think that DayZ is the ultimate internet survival simulator. It really brings out the best and the worst in players. In my few weeks with the DayZ Standalone, I've encountered helpful travelers, wacky naked psychopaths, and dozens of greedy bandits. Although at times I feel like it's just filled with immature griefers, there have been times where I've been truly amazed by the behavior of some other players in the game.

At one point, I found another traveler who became friendly once he realized I wasn't going to gun him down for fun. He taught me some of the more advanced control functions and walked with me all the way to the next town where he got disconnected by the game server. Another person tried to knock me out with his bare fists when he thought that I didn't know how to play the game (I pretended like I didn't know how to work the controls). 

I've run into players while looting abandoned buildings, some who were extremely helpful and even offered to split some of the loot we discovered. I've run into other players who just waited outside highly visited areas to take pot shots at unsuspecting survivors.

And then there are the psychos.

This person lured me into a building with ukulele music and proceeded to chop me up with a fire axe.

 DayZ is what you make of it. You can be a bandit, a hero, a psycho, even a guy who rolls around the ground in your underpants like a worm. (Go prone and press Q or A). Go out there, have fun, and try not to shoot on sight!

Outlast: It's okay to pee your pants

I started by journey into Outlast last night. That journey lasted exactly 2 hours, as I found myself a bit too freaked out to continue at that point. Within those 2 hours, I counted 2 times where I scooted my chair back and yelped "oh shit", and at least 3 other times where my heart jumped after being scared by something on screen. Needless to say, Outlast is the scariest game I've played in a really long time. If you have some spare diapers at home, I suggest you check it out.

DayZ: Let's meet a PvP Psycho

I was walking around Electro in the DayZ standalone and I heard this strange sound... it sounded like Tiny Tim's Tiptoe Through the Tulips...


My first legit scare in DayZ

DayZ: My longest adventure in Chernarus thus far

2 days. That is exactly how long I lasted in my longest play through of DayZ. Here are some pictures of my first foray into Chernarus.

Why I'm Not Playing Battlefield 4

A few months ago I was genuinely excited to get my hands on the latest Battlefield game. I played through the Battlefield 4 beta and I definitely had a blast. I waited with baited breath for the UPS delivery guy to bring in my Battlefield 4 box. I tore that thing open and installed it immediately. I thought I was going to be in Battlefield bliss.

3.5 months later and I'm sad to say I'm over it. I've been over it since November. Battlefield 4 has been a giant bug filled fiasco. A giant clusterfuck of a game launch. There were times where I would load up a game and just have a blast. That was the minority of the time. The rest of the time I spent wondering whether I would make it through an entire match without the server crashing and my stats being reset. I would wonder if the hit detection was even working as I unloaded full magazines into enemies without them being registered. I wonder why the hell am I not receiving the weapon unlocks from finishing the campaign after finishing it 4 separate times. Frustrating experiences like this often stick in the minds of gamers. After dropping $60 of hard earned cash on a game, you would expect it to be mostly playable, right? I guess it could be my fault for always trying to be an early adopter of franchises I love. I almost bought Battlefield Premium, but I'm quite glad that my inner cheapskate told me to wait.

I guess only time will tell if Battlefield 4 will ever draw me back in. For now, I'll just stick to games that advertise themselves as still being in alpha (like Day Z), instead of trying to pass off broken games as full fledged releases.

Adventures in twitch.tv streaming

I've begun my adventure into live twitch.tv streaming. You can watch me play whatever game I feel like playing over on the nerd sophisticate streaming page. I should be hopping on most nights to stream Starcraft 2, DayZ, and some of the other 300+ games in my library.

http://www.twitch.tv/nerdsophisticate

Awesome DayZ Interaction

I'm still waiting for a crazy PvP moment like this in DayZ. So far I've only encountered random snipers and people who log out once they get attacked. These guys, however, make the PvP game much more... interesting.

Splinter Cell: Blacklist PC Review

I'm going to be very forthcoming with this one: Personally, Splinter Cell has always taken a backseat to Metal Gear Solid. I've never been extremely fond of the series and the last Splinter Cell game played was Double Agent, which came out in 2006. That being said, I needed to fill the gaping stealth action hole that MGS has left in my gaming life and decided to give Blacklist I spin. I was pleasantly surprised.

I picked up Splinter Cell Blacklist on the UbiStore and downloaded it through the UPlay client. I won't get into detail right now about my feelings regarding UPlay, but basically it feels like a low rent version of Origin. I would've preferred this game as a Steamworks title, but Ubisoft is persistent about making us use UPlay to play its games.

Straight out of the gates, I realized this wasn't the same Sam Fisher that I controlled back in 2006. This Sam Fisher is a brutal killing machine, only being held back by my own qualms about killing every hostile NPC in site. The gameplay has changed dramatically, allowing you to choose your own playstyle and rewarding you as such. Want to sneak around and choke the crap out of every enemy soldier? You can do that. Want to climb over them and just reach the objective without alerting anyone? You can do that. You want to turn this game into Splinter Cell/Gears of War? You can definitely do that too. The cover shooter mechanics that have been woven into Blacklist have really changed the formula for me in a good way. Now when I alert enemies, I don't always have to go running to the next dark corner or ceiling pipe. I can hunker down and blast away with an automatic shotgun or non-suppressed MP5. The game rewards different playstyles with points that are converted into currency. The currency allows you to purchase weapons, suit upgrades, gadgets, and other items that you can tailor to your playstyle. It actually feels quite Hitman-esque, with certain upgrades and playstyles reminding me of a watered down version of Hitman Blood Money, which is actually a good thing.

The graphics on the PC version are great. Blacklist employs the Unreal engine, which when done without the giant hulking soldier bodies actually looks quite realistic. The engine rendered cutscenes are also quite a nice, with the closeups of the characters revealing an insane amount of detail. Stuble has never looked this nice.

The story is a pretty decent Tom Clancy yarn. I enjoyed it quite a bit and it ties into the previous installments quite nicely (from what I remember). There are also fun side missions that range from stealth infiltration to a horde mode type of wave survival, which I actually found to be quite fun.

If you have a stealth action itch that you need to scratch, you should definitely give Splinter Cell Blacklist I try. Oh and I haven't figured out how to do the wall splits maneuver yet, maybe they took it out of the game.

My first hour of DayZ

My first hour of DayZ can be described with one simple screenshot I snapped.

Here's hoping for more adventures.

Amazon Editor's Choice Game Sale

Amazon is having this pretty decent 2013 Editor's Choice Game sale right now. If you purchased any digital PC games from Amazon in December, you were given a $5 credit to spend on a game included in the sale. The sale is constantly updating and titles/prices are changing, so keep an eye out this month on anything that tickles your fancy. Currently "Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons" is $2.50 after credit and NBA 2k14 is $15 after credit, which are pretty good deals in my opinion. Go check it out here.

Humble Bundle X

PSA: Humble Bundle X is now available. Unfortunately there was some controversy with this bundle as Humble offered the first 1000 people to donate $10 or more a key for Starbound. This led to the beat the average price to be quite higher than it normally would be. That being said, this is still a pretty solid bundle.

Return from Holiday hiatus

So I've returned from an extended holiday hiatus with tons and tons of games to review in tow.

This is what's currently on my docket:

Splinter Cell Blacklist
Assassin's Creed 4
DayZ
Metro Last Light

I'll start pumping these reviews out shortly.