Sony’s Playlink series of local multiplayer games for the PlayStation 4 have been an interesting move into a space usually dominated by Nintendo titles, and a recognition of the power of people physically, not virtually sitting together in a room together. They have also been a bit experimental, with each title making some interesting moves forward in ways that work, and some that don’t as much.

The latest entry is Melbits World, a lemmings style game that also reminded me of the excellent Death Squared by Australian developers SMG Studio. Melbits World features a deceptively simple premise, to move your melbits (little blobby creatures) from the entry pipe to the exit pipe. But it’s the obstacles between you and the pipe that makes the game interesting. There’s an easy comparison to lemmings when thinking about how Melbits World works, and it has strong similarities to Nintendo’s Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker in the diorama-style presentation of each Level as a self-contained puzzle box. But this would ignore the significant difference that having local, co-operative multiplayer brings to the table.

Like the Jackbox series of games, you play almost entirely on your phone. To get started you simply download a 200MB app to your iOS or Android phone and connect to the same network the PS4 is on. The phone acts as your controller, and is much more responsive than the setup that you would find in the Jackbox Party Pack games. Though asking your friends to go download an app is a much larger barrier to entry than simply typing in a website’s URL, a real app on your phone gives you a level of flexibility and control than a website could do.

You can play with up to four players. But the complexity in communication rises with the number of players, however with fewer players there’s more things for which each player is responsible. It’s an interesting tension, and things can get quite chaotic with four people each shouting out what to do at each obstacle. Playing Melbits World with multiple people requires you all to have good communication and the ability to understand just what your friend means by “left blue now!” and other such commands.

Those obstacles getting between you and the exit could be platforms that need moving, bridges that retract, directional pads that can be used to guide your melbits in multiple directions, bats, viruses, spring pads and more. You’ll have to very quickly make yourself familiar with each level, as once the Level starts melbits will start appearing at a regular interval, and if you can’t guide them smoothly through each stage of their journey to the exit, things quickly break down.

While you can “win” each Level by simply getting to the end, you can ramp up the challenge by seeking out bonus seeds and prizes that contain clothes and accessories to customise your melbits. The melbits themselves look relatively distinctive, and they and the levels they are in are full of cute pastel colours and soft, round shapes.

There are around 30 Levels in three main worlds, in addition to an arcade mode, which is more replayable. Nevertheless, in comparison to the other Playlink series of games, Melbits World is more of a play through it once type of experience. That said, seeing how different friends react to the challenge of each Level could be worth it to get a better glimpse at their puzzle-solving skills and personality.

At times Melbits World can be frustrating with how quickly it asks you to understand and use new abilities and commands (e.g. using a spring asks you to hold down a slider on your phone and release it, where the commands aren’t obvious nor demonstrated), and level designs. That said, there is no penalty for messing up, so you can simply start again.

Perhaps best suited to shorter bursts of game time, Melbits World is a solid new entry into the series that could be a for good after-dinner downtime, or something to keep the kids occupied for a few Levels. While it does require a bit more gaming skill than other similar titles, it remains accessible enough for all to get into a bit of Melbits World.

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The first Knowledge is Power game made the case for the PlayLink experience. Being able to play a fun quiz game, like Buzz was, without the extra peripherals or extra controllers, is a real winner as nearly everyone has a smart phone now.

Knowledge is Power: Decades is the same game, with a decade-based spin. Throughout a game you have phases where you choose a decade from the 1980’s through to 2010’s, and then the topics you subsequently choose will be based in that decade. It’s a fun little change to an otherwise solid quiz game.

For people that don’t have experience with its predecessor, what makes the game worth your while is the attacks you launch on your competitors. Before each question, you choose a way to annoy one of your opponents on your phone, which usually gets in the way of them answering the question on their phone. The most frustrating of these is the zips, where zips will appear on their phone which covering every answer, and they need to unzip them to see their options. Here invaluable seconds can be lost ceding their potential winning place.

The general format of the game is you answer the questions, get points for correct answers, the faster you are the more points you get, to grow your total. This then ends with the ultimate round where you all must make your way up the stairs by correctly answering questions quickly to win the game. The points you got throughout the game dictates where you start on said stairs, but it does give a good chance for any player to catch up suddenly.

The game isn’t the prettiest to look at, with basic designs and a host that looks mildly annoying. Fortunately, the voice acting isn’t annoying, so having him walk you through the game isn’t jarring; well until you hear the same lines between questions a few too many times, that is. The player’s avatars are chosen by selecting a character, which then has the face filled in with a picture you take with your phone. It’s a silly idea, but it does make for some laughs if you let yourself get into it.

There isn’t too much more to say about Knowledge is Power: Decades. The new spin of choosing a decade limits the game a little because there is guaranteed no trivia from before the 80’s. In some ways that makes it inferior to the original, but there is some added value to the experience, so it winds up being about the same, with a slight difference, and that’s good enough to justify a fun night with the family or friends.

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The mobile market has made for an interesting market of games, and with a huge pool that makes it hard for a game to rise to the top. Of the few that do, some make their money ticking over repetitive content, others use it as a footing to move to consoles, the later is what World of Warriors has done as it explores the world of the PS4.

World of Warriors doesn’t have too much of a narrative. Basically, a bunch of Warriors from different time periods, and some fantasy, are all fighting in tournaments. That’s it, the game is built around its gameplay loop more than anything, and it’s fine.

The gameplay is simple. You are placed in a circular ring, and need to kill your enemy, or enemies. There are only a couple of attack buttons, and your combos with them are limited at best. Most of your time will be using them and timing, balanced with retreating to win.

Generally, for a match you choose two of your Warriors, and go head to head with your opponent’s two Warriors. First to two wins, i.e. knocking out both of your opponent’s warriors twice, wins the match, and you can move on. As you win fights you unlock currency, to buy new Warriors.

That’s how you will spending your hours playing World of Warriors. When you fight you have two bars, one of which fills throughout the match and can be activated with the D-Pad, and another which fill via orbs that get dropped when you are hit, which can unleash some powerful attacks.

The game does mix it up a little with the arenas, the first of which is with treasure boxes dropping. These drop throughout the match, and when opened can give health, bombs, and items to be collected for crafting. The bombs can be picked up and thrown, but this can be hard to master, which AI has no issues with. Collecting the items for crafting is essential as it’s the only way I ever saw them drop.

The other way arenas mix it up is with the environments. They may have things like rotating flamethrowers, whirlpools, or bosses in the backgrounds that do random attacks. These attacks give warnings, which you can use to squeeze some extra health off enemies, but for the most part, they are there for no apparent reason.

The best matches in the game are the Colosseum fights which puts your one fighter against a couple, and as the fight goes on, a timer pops up signalling another fighters entrance. Kind of like a Royal Rumble but with none of the nostalgia, and lots of the same average combat. There are also boss fights which aren’t too inspired, again it’s some variety, but that match variety isn’t the game’s biggest weakness.

The games biggest weakness is the combat is average, and the matches are too long. AI regularly runs away from you, and then when you get close to them defends. If you use their strategy and wait back, they can take ages to come to you. With this, and up to three matches, of up to three fighters being knocked out, makes the game get dull quickly.

World of Warriors may be one of the most average games I have ever played. It’s not bad by any means, it’s straight down the middle. Many gamers will get some entertainment out there but even with its Kinder Surprise Twistheads aesthetic, it’s a tough game to recommend.

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Frantics is the latest in the Playlink series of games released by Sony.

There’s been a huge growth of electronic party games, spurred on by the rise of games such as the Jackbox Party Packs. I’m a massive fan of these games, and thoroughly enjoyed Sony’s first entry into the genre with That’s You! It managed to be technically more impressive than the Jackbox games (which are often look like slightly gussied-up powerpoint presentations) while also giving its own twist on mini games. The change to review Frantics was a great excuse for a catch up, so I invited a few friends over for dinner, and sat them down with Sony’s latest Playlink game to see what they thought.

To get started with Frantics you and your friends will have to download an app to play. This puts a lot more friction between “want to play a game?” and actually playing the game compared to just going to a website, but it does allow for much richer experiences than a basic website can provide. I also found there was less lag using an app than a website, which makes putting in last minute answers much less fear-inducing. Overall I think the trade-off is worth it in terms of functionality vs ease of use, but you may have to help less technically-savvy friends and family members get set up.

Once you’re in though, what can you expect?

As usual for this genre, there’s a selection of mini games, selected at random at the start of the match. A smarmy, toffy-nosed British fox is your host, and while he doesn’t add too much to the experience he does provide good glue between each activity. As for the games, there’s a competitive endless-runner type games, a competitive parachute test, and a good variety of others. Many of them use your phone like a wiimote, pitching it back and forth and side to side to move your character around on screen. For the most past it works fine, and the mini games are well made and interesting.

What ultimately attracts us to these games however, is not how they work in and of themselves, but how they affect the relationships between those in the room. And this is a key difference between Frantics and the Jackbox games. In Jackbox the humour comes from what the people in the room are writing, drawing or scheming, while in Frantics the humour is instead based on what your on screen avatars are getting up to. While neither one is better than the other, it is fundamentally a different type of experience, and it is worth noting for how it affects the mood in the room.

More game than other party games, your friends and family will need to have much better hand-eye coordination and experience in how video games works as a whole than other entries in this party game genre require. Playing one of these games that require a bit more precision or fast reflexes was a nice differentiator for Frantics and in the end it was some of the smoothest co-op in games I’ve ever experienced.

As games become ever-more embedded in our culture and forms of play, this genre of game, somewhere in between a video game and a board game, will become ever more common. Sony has clearly caught onto the trend, and the games released so far in the PlayLink series have all been good entries. Frantics is another entry that’s well worth adding to your collection, and is subtly different enough from what you already probably own to justify its purchase.

For those looking for a good laugh and something to do with friends or family once dinner is done, Frantics will slot right in to your schedule, its combination of humour and mini games a dessert in its own right.

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PlayStation have pioneered console gaming over the years, leaving a path for others to follow.

They were the first to make the move from side scrolling platformers that we had become used to in the 90’s to 3D free roam adventures.

Then there was augmented reality with EyeToy, EyePet still being one of my faves.

Now we have the only home console that offers VR Gaming and now, Playlink.

Playlink allows PS gamers to instantly and effortlessly connect their smartphone to their PlayStation 4 making your iOS or Android device a crucial part of the gameplay.

Two years ago, when the Next Gen version of Singstar released, was our first introduction to Playlink. Downloading a Singstar App turned your phone into a wireless microphone for you to belt out ballads to your overly impressed (or frightened) friends and family (and pets).

In the last few weeks, PlayStation have really hit home the smart device connectivity with a slew of Playlink releases.

Planet of the Apes – Playlink

The first one of this year was That’s You!. A multiplayer trivia game where when played with friends, you are tasked with working out who knows you best.

A series of trivia questions and hand drawings about eachother results in at least one of the players scoring a result that makes them your true best friend… or stalker as they know alot about you.

Now there’s Planet of the Apes.

In this one your mobile device syncs to your console and becomes a controller.

In Planet of the Apes Playlink title it is a story based game, produced by Andy Serkis (actor from Planet of the Apes films) and it tells an untold story in the films’ timeline.

You are presented with a series of choices in which you need to choose the decision for the characters. Ultimately this will affect the outcome of the game. With most having only two decisions to choose from, there are two at least endings.

Singstar has risen again, this time in the way of Singstar Celebration. A handful of recent songs for you to do a hearty rendition to are included and as with the previous PlayStation 4 Singstar, your smartphone becomes the microphone.

Hidden Agenda – Playlink

Hidden Agenda again sees you pair up your mobile phone with the Playlink App and it’s your choice within gameplay to Solve or Sabotage.

Up to five smartphone equipped friends can play with each player having their own set objectives in this suspenseful title. What makes this a killer game is that you will not know if the other players are working with you or against you…

Remember Buzz!?

Well… Knowledge is Power is very very similar. With this title you can pit your general knowledge and speedy response times off against Playlink equipped pals in a race to the Pyramid of Knowledge.

All questions are themed and you can add your own selfie in to the game aswell as choose anyone of the 8 playable characters. Use your smartphone to answer the Questions as quick as you can.

Knowledge is Power – Playlink

Playlink is most definitely a holiday season gig worth treating yourself to. As mentioned your device will connect up to your PlayStation 4. Download the free App that corresponds to the Playlink game that you are playing and then start the game. Once the game is loaded, tapping the games’ App will scan for your PlayStation 4 (you need to be on the same WiFi Home Network) and magic, it will find your console and you connect… and it’s game on.

With it’s simplistic ease of use and even more Playlink titles on their way, PlayStation are setting a new standard for how we play games, all over again.

This season it’s a PlayStation Party at yours… just remind your friends to charge their phones before they arrive.

The post PlayStation Playlink Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

PlayStation have always been the forerunners for social play.

Back in the PlayStation 2 days they bought us Singstar and Buzz!

Their latest offering; That’s You! adapts a would be boardgame in to digital play via their Playlink service.

Playlink allows you to use Bluetooth to connect your smart device via a games’ App to your PlayStation 4 console and control the game via your smart device. We have seen similar in the PS4 version of Singstar.

That’s You! is a chill-lax game that must be played with more than one player. A minimum of two or party play with up to six in one go.

The game prompts you to pick a card from 12 available, then you are advised by the overly cheerful commentator with a Canadian accent to set up your Profile which includes a selfie.

All of this then appears on your TV screen via the game, totally seamlessly and instantly.

Once all of this is done, That’s You! is a game that, well is all about YOU. But it is not yourself telling the game how wondrous you are… it is up to the other players to figure out what type of person you are by way of decisions and choices in given situations that you would make (or yourself figuring out your friends).

Badges worth 200 points each are awarded after each round for every matching answer. So it’s like this; if YOU are being Profiled by That’s You! you are asked a Question in which you respond as to how or what your decision in the given situation would be. The other players have to try and guess what your decision would be. If they get it right, they are awarded Points, wrong, they get nothing but the shame of not being the close friend they thought they were.

It’s not all about Questions though. You will be tasked with drawing and mimicking other images. In these rounds Players vote for the best picture – or a picture that accurately reflects you.

Matching answers among all Players win points.

There are also Joker rounds where you can earn even more points and the Player(s) with the most points after the three rounds or so are metered on their friend level. Meaning the more that they know about you, the closer the friend they are.

I can see this being an interesting title to play on a date night.

There are also further gameplay customizable options where you can opt to only play certain aspects of the game in party play or with another, focused on Drawings or tailored Questions and  an additional Mode called Pass it On.

Nonetheless, gameplay is super simple and in a group of friends it can be alot of fun.

That’s You! requires the That’s You! App to be installed on your Android or Apple phone. What I am super impressed with is the simplicity of Playlink.

Myself having reviewed alot of Apps and wireless peripherals over the years I always expect a bit of fussing around to get the connection setup. Playlink, exclusive to PlayStation just works. In an instant and I am hopeful that this is utilised more in future.

That’s You! is not only super budgetly priced but is also a must have title during this rainy cold season. Gather a bunch of mates together, or pluck up the courage to ask that special person out on a date night and find out how well you really know eachother.

The post That’s You! (PlayStation 4) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

StG is in L. A. and the PlayStation E3 2017 Media Showcase has just come to a close at The Shrine Auditorium in central Los Angeles, bringing with it all manner of gaming news. As expected, PlayStation put on a show for it’s fans at E3 2017 to showcase up and coming titles with extended features streamed for us, the attending audience and the rest of the PlayStation gamers around the world.

We saw spectacular new trailers for the likes of God of War, Days Gone, Spider-Man, Call of Duty WWII, Destiny 2 and Detroit: Become Human; alongside a host of new game reveals, including Shadow of the Colossus for PS4, new PlayStation VR horror The Inpatient, the new PlayLink range, and Monster Hunter: World from Capcom. And that’s to name but a few.

PlayStation E3 Conference 2017

PlayLink, what is that I hear you ponder.

Combining your smartphone or tablet device, TV and PS4 console, with a collection of brand new games that take advantage of the smartphone or tablet device’s touchscreen and camera capabilities.Exclusive to PlayStation 4, PlayLink titles are designed to be played in a group setting, allowing for a truly fun and dynamic experience. The collection of PlayLink games vary from gritty crime thrillers to quick-fire quizzes. If you have a smartphone or tablet, and your PS4 hooked up to a TV, you’re already set.

PlayLink games turn your smartphone or tablet into a versatile controller – you can swipe, pinch, drag, tilt, rotate or even snap selfies and draw crafty doodles, depending on the game. No matter which title you choose from our PlayLink collection, it’s guaranteed to be a slick pick-up-and-play experience.

PlayStation PlayLink

PlayStation also informed the cheering crowds of it’s Sales lead milestone – having cumulatively sold through more than 60.40M PlayStation 4 units to consumers worldwide as of June 11th, 2017.

Then it was on to the really good stuff – games.

We were introduced to Moss.

A PSVR exclusive where you are both guiding the hero Quill with the gamepad and at the same time reaching in and interacting with the environment directly.

Moss tells the tale of the first adventure of an unlikely hero named Quill—a small mouse from a remote forest settlement who is fated to be the key in a much larger story. One day while exploring the woods she finds a mysterious stone and an ancient magic is awakened, linking you together in an extraordinary alliance.

In gameplay, her skills are complementary to yours. You’ll guide her actions through familiar action-adventure controls, while also directly manipulating the field of play as your own character. Mutual communication and shared victories will only strengthen your connection to each other and further your joint resolve.

It’s very cute and a definite play for any PSVR fan.

Moss – PSVR

God of War was astounding and looking signature to it’s very lengthy legend. Details revealed were that  this new God of War title will differ from previous editions in the series.

Having been built from the ground up this title featuring a vastly different looking Kratos will be Single Player only (at this stage) a step away from the inclusion of multiplayer as introduced in God of War Ascension.

God of War will be more like an RPG where players will craft an earn knowledge points to better skill and equip themselves. Furthermore having always been a third person actioner, there is a camera adjustment, where the play view will above the right shoulder – as is now common place (and better in my opinion) in similar games.

The Rage ability that we are familair with will have a make-over with Spartan Rage, a timed ability. We can expect Kratos to own our PS4’s once again in 2018.

God of War – PlayStation 4

At last years E3 PlayStation debuted their upcoming open-world action title Days Gone By, where you play as Deacon, set in set in the beautiful high desert of the Pacific Northwest two years after a pandemic has transformed the world. This year the title was touched upon again with some crisp looking new demo footage.

Days Gone By is shaping up to be a title worth waiting for.

We also meet Marcus from Detroit: Become Human.

Detroit: Become Human is Quantic Dream’s next title, for both PlayStation 4 and PS4 Pro. It is a neo-noir existential thriller, set in a near future, where androids look, speak, and move like human beings, and operate in society at every level from manufacturers to teachers. It is not long before a more human element starts to come effect for the Androids and they begin to desire freedom…

Markus (played by Jesse Williams) is an android who escaped his master and joined a small group of deviants hiding underground in Detroit.

The new scene we witnessed at E3 this year, Markus executes a covert operation during a cold Detroit night, with the aim of freeing androids that are for sale in a store. If he succeeds, Markus will have the opportunity to send a strong message to humans.

Detroit: Beyond Human – Markus

And not forgetting the simulator / petrol-head PlayStation fans, the mighty Gran Turismo was also featured, with Tokyo Expressway and Nürburgring circuits highlighted in new gameplay footage shown and we learned of the inclusion of the Bathurst track.

Gran Turismo Sport (GT Sport) releases this coming Autumn, exclusively on PlayStation 4.

Of course the new Uncharted: Lost Legacy which is just around the corner premiered. we learned more about the set pieces, the puzzles, cinematic storytelling, and exotic locales and a more indepth telling of the  completely new story with Chloe Frazer at the helm.

Cloe is on the hunt for the legendary golden Tusk of Ganesh forged by the ancient Hoysala Empire, and to find it, she enlists the help of Nadine Ross. However, if there’s anything we know about Chloe and Nadine, it’s that they both keep things close to the vest. Over the course of the story, we’ll explore Chloe and Nadine’s struggle to trust one another.

Uncharted: Lost Legacy releases worldwide, exclusively for PlayStation 4 on the 23rd of August, 2017.

Shadow of the Colossus – PlayStation 4 Remaster

This generation of gaming has seen alot of remasters, we and the rest of the audience were both surprised and elated at the reveal of the re-worked Shadow of the Colussus. A groundbreaking game that originally released on the PlayStation 2 back in 2005.

Being fully re-rendered Shadow of the Colossus is a definite welcome to the PlayStation 4 library and is essentially a game that works and is ideal for the console.

In other bits that were covered, the mighty Farpoint is getting some DLC called the Cryo Pack, a new PSVR co-op title called Bravo Team, an intriguing horror title for PSVR; The Inpatient, Knack gets a sequel and Monster Hunter is making a welcome return to PlayStation with Monster Hunter: World.

Then there was the Spiderman Demo.

Spiderman – PlayStation 4

Based on the Marvel franchise this new Spiderman title mixes up the familiar with the unexpected.

Avoiding a retelling of his origin story the new Spider-Man features a 23-year-old Peter Parker who has become a masterful Spider-Man. While he may be more experienced, Peter and Spider-Man’s worlds continue to collide as he tries to juggle them.

PlayStation showed off a real-time gameplay demo where Spider-Man has arrived at a construction site owned by Wilson Fisk (a.k.a. the Kingpin). Fisk’s men are under assault by a gang known as the Inner Demons, and Spider-Man has to stop the bloodshed. In the process, he learns that Martin Li, one of the city’s most prominent philanthropists, secretly leads the Inner Demons via his alter-ego, Mr. Negative.

Martin Li runs the F.E.A.S.T. shelters all across town which only further complicates things for Peter Parker’s personal life, as his beloved Aunt May works at F.E.A.S.T.

It was fast paced, smooth and enough superhero eyecandy to satiate even the hardest of critics. The demo displayed the mechanics of gameplay. Spider-Man’s more powerful improvisational and acrobatic combat style with honed skills making him stronger and more confident in combat. Dodging, using webs, and aerial combat are all second nature.

We saw usage of Web Trip Wire and impact webs. Spiderman on PlayStation 4 will introduce many new gadgets and devices that can be used as during the course of the game.

In all the PlayStation Conference was a spectacular moment for gaming as a whole. With PlayStation having the inclusion of Virtual Reality (VR) via the PSVR it was pleasing to see this medium continually evolve and grow with new titles pushing the capabilities.

At the conclusion of the two hour Conference gamers and media alike were left with a sense of impatient-ness – wanting to play and own all of what we just witnessed.

The year ahead for PlayStation and PlayStation 4 / PSVR owners is an exciting one indeed.

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