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the best Multiverse games | Team Talk

25/5/2022

 
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Smashing through realities and turning the world upside down seems to be all the rage in entertainment right now, not least in WB Games’ Multiversus, which got us thinking about our favourite universe-spinning gaming experiences.

Of course the likes of Kingdom Hearts bring together multiple franchises and locations by default, but other games have been more nuanced in how they've tackled exploring the multiverse.

Does anything multi-dimensional stand out for you? Let us know in the comments.
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​by Team PTC

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​@pass_controller

BioShock Infinite | James Michael Parry

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Something about BioShock has always filled me with wonder and fear. With Infinite, I wanted to leap in headfirst, and the dimensional elements were a clever gameplay mechanic and a very effective storytelling device.

Without spoiling the games plot (definitely worth playing the game if you haven’t checked it out), particularly towards the end you find yourself introduced to the idea of branching realities and you end up in a bit of an aimless exploration of infinite lighthouses – there’s always a lighthouse, as the game says.

In terms of the gameplay. Certain areas of the game’s world are weak points between realities, and co-protagonist Elisabeth can help you by granting the power to pull elements like turrets or alternative pathways into your universe.

It brings an interesting twist on the game’s floating world, Columbia, as a whole, which already feels like a Black Mirror take on an overly-patriotic America, and seems to make the eccentricities more believable, purely because there is an in-game explanation for things feeling a bit unusual, helping you to settle in and suspend disbelief quickly.

While it’s not without its limitations – if you could pull in everything anywhere the game would be over quite quickly – the reality-bending aspect was the most compelling since the likes of Valve first introduced some of these ideas with Portal.

Sea of Thieves | Liam Andrews

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Last year’s Pirates of the Caribbean-themed content for Sea of Thieves was a bit of a surprise announcement, even though really, when you think about it, the two fit quite well together.

Making my way through these special missions (I think I’ve only got one to go) was a lot of fun, and often tasked players with delving into strange new worlds deep below the waves or beyond the 'living' realm. While I’m not the biggest POTC fan, I do have a fondness for the first two films, and I enjoyed stumbling across items or characters directly linked to them. Swimming through the wreck of the Black Pearl was a particular highlight.

Away from gameplay, Sea of Thieves has also been pretty good at incorporating other notable franchises in the form of cosmetics, which is also fun. The Spartan set that turned up in my inventory one day was pretty cool, and even though I prefer to mix and match items rather than use a complete set, it was still nice to have, and don't forget the limited-edition Borderlands-themed ship.

Rare have even gone so far as to reference the very machines we play games on, with The Duke ship set boasting the bright, red, green, blue and yellow of the Xbox face buttons as well as a generous helping of black and neon green colouring.​

Injustice 2 | Chris Brand

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Injustice 2 uses DC's well-established Multiverse as a tool for storytelling and a totally believable, in-universe, reason for adding a whole bunch of wacky modifiers to fights. Heroes and villains can switch allegiances, sometimes becoming the very thing they despise, sans any changes to the real characters we know and love.

The single-player Story mode is similar in design to the more recent entries in NetherRealm Studios' flagship fighter Mortal Kombat, giving players a few fights with a variety of characters as chapters progress. The writing is as good as you would expect, telling a tale through relatively short cutscenes and managing to flesh out the plot without pulling players away from the action for too long.

Multiverse mode plays out like a series of ever-changing "What If" scenarios, which fits in nicely with the overall narrative. Everything is canon, just not always in this universe.

​DC Comics' gargantuan catalogue, built up over many decades, requires re-invention in order to not get stale and it's an excellent mechanic to incorporate in
Injustice, as there's a constant stream of shiny new things to unlock and DLC fighters can be added seamlessly, even from other Warner Bros. properties, such as Mortal Kombat's Sub-Zero and Raiden.
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Multiversus Preview | Taken for a Quickie

23/5/2022

 
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Warner Bros. various worlds collide in the latest brawler from WB Games, we took MultiVersus for a spin, during its closed alpha, to give you our first impressions.

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by James Michael Parry

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@james_parry

So, what’s MultiVersus all about?
There’s not a huge amount of story setup, but the gist of it is that characters like Batman, Steven Universe, Shaggy from Scooby Doo and even Game of Thrones' Arya Stark fight it out in themed arenas.

That sounds a lot like Super Smash Bros...?
There’s no denying it, there are definitely plenty of similarities – tumbling characters off the screen even triggers the same explosion animation – but the cast of colourful characters are all WB’s own, and show off a variety of different fighting styles (including “brawlers” like Taz the Tazmanian devil from Animaniacs), with a cartoony visual style which brings everything together.

What’s it like to play?
The tutorial, even just in the alpha, is broken down to really walk you through dodges, movement and a variety of moves, which, naturally, vary from character to character. The standard two against two or 4-player free-for-all is about as chaotic as you’d expect, but some of the characters feel a little sluggish to move, particularly in the air. Plus there’s no items to mix things up during fights.​
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What is there to keep you playing?
Of the 15 characters (which will no doubt expand after launch), five are locked away behind in-game currency coins, which will be available as premium currency when the game eventually launches, free-to-play around July, after an open beta.

Within the game there’s a plethora of unlocks including character variants (a.k.a. costumes), ringout animations, taunts, 2D emotes, profile icons and banners, but otherwise, beyond mastering each character’s moves, there’s no singleplayer story to explore here.

How are the characters?
As you might expect, it’s a bit of a mixed bag. Even though each character has the same basic controls, some movesets can feel more varied than others. For example, Wonder Woman has a lasso and a variety of shield moves to play around with, but Taz seems to turn into a whirlwind at the drop of a hat.

You can customise characters’ play style to a small extent with a series of offensive and defensive perks, which unlock once you’ve main-ed them for a while, though it was difficult to say how much of an impact this had on gameplay after only a few days of play.​
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So what’s the verdict?
There have been plenty of games which have gone after Smash Bros.' crown in the past to varying success, from PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale to Brawlhalla, and none have really hit the spot. Warner Bros. certainly has a suite of characters to choose from, if the never-ending cameos in Space Jam A New Legacy are anything to go by, so there’s certainly potential for fun future updates.

In terms of what’s here right now, given it will be free-to-play it ticks the boxes you’d expect, but there might not be enough variety of stages to keep hardcore fighting fans hooked in the long run. Once the open beta rolls around in July, which seems likely to lead right into the full release, we’ll see the full range of content the game has to offer. For now, it’s one to keep an eye on.
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What's Your Favourite Sonic Game? | Team Talk

1/5/2022

 
Sonic in Sonic 2 and Sonic Adventure 2: Battle

As if Sonic returning to cinemas for a second time wasn’t enough, SEGA decided to spoil us further recently with the announcement of Sonic Origins, a remastered collection of four undisputed classic Sonic titles: Sonic The Hedgehog, Sonic 2, Sonic CD and Sonic 3: Sonic and Knuckles.

Since some of us played one or two of these the first time around, we’re of a generation that grew up with the fastest blue blur in video games, it got us thinking about what our favourite outing might be.

Do you have a favourite? Is it in this remastered collection? Let us know in the comments.

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​by Team PTC

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@pass_controller

James | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle | Gamecube

Sonic and Shadow snowboard down a road, just because
While I do have a very soft spot for Sonic 2, as I've mentioned before, by the time the GameCube rolled around, I was in my gaming prime, which meant appreciating games far more than I did in the MegaDrive era.

Sonic Adventure 2: Battle was not only my first 3D Sonic game, having given the much beloved Dreamcast a miss, but also one of my first experiences of a port, and a port done well, since Battle threw in a few extras in its move over from SEGA’s hardware.

I have fond memories of wasting far too much time in the Chao garden, and probably replaying City Escape a few times too many just to hear the, in my ears at least, iconic theme music.

Most fun of all was Shadow. The dark, somewhat one-dimensional anti-hero of this Sonic adventure, proving to be Sonic’s equal in almost every way – and a character that turned me onto the previously unknown world of soap shoes and rail grinding. So much grinding.

In the end, I not only completed the game, but also spent a fair amount of time on the game’s other modes, one of which saw characters like Knuckles and Rouge the Bat digging for emeralds for some reason. Give us a do-over of this classic next please SEGA?

Chris | Sonic The  Hedgehog 2 | MegaDrive/Genesis

Sonic and Tales in the Hidden Palace Zone
Sonic's second clash with Dr. Robotnik (as he was known at the time) has a special place in my heart for a couple of reasons. It was the first game I remember playing with my old man, him leading the way as the eponymous hedgehog and me darting about as Tails.

​Looking back, I probably wasn't as much help as I could have been, but being able to respawn infinitely without penalty meant that my dad could concentrate on getting through the level without having to keep an eye on me.


Whilst the option of playing in co-op was a huge draw, the biggest addition must surely be the Spin Dash move, which allowed players to quickly get a speed boost from standstill, making those loops easier to navigate and saving from having to backtrack until you had ample space to hit full sprint.

When I think of Sonic 2, the Casino Night Zone instantly pops into my head. The music is burned into my brain for all eternity as we spent far longer on the big slot machine than we needed to, only leaving when we had hit the jackpot enough times to be loaded with gold rings. It's a trait that my dad still carries with him to this very day.​
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