WWE 2K16 Reviews 2017

If you’re a wrestling fan or just enjoy watching some fighting, then WWE 2K16 is a must have game. Every year, 2K releases a new set of sports games, ranging from MLB 2K16 to NBA 2K16, and every year they dominate the industry.

This is mostly due to the fact that 2K simply makes very intuitive sports games. This year, 2K is releasing the largest roster they’ve ever had for wrestling. They’ve announced over 120 different characters, including the WWE superstars and even the female divas.
If you get bored of playing with all of these different characters, fear not! You can make your own if you choose to. The gameplay gets more and more fluid with each passing year, and this year is no different.
2K has added and improved all of the animations, making it look as real as possible, with thousands of additions. They also say that they’ve improved the reversal moves and the holds.
Everyone’s favorite chair fights are also back and better than ever. It won’t just be random fights every time you play. You can choose to play the single player campaign – 2K showcase.
In 2K showcase you’ll actually play the most memorable WWE matches of all time, while simultaneously unlocking unforgettable characters and outfits. As was mentioned earlier, you can choose to change it up and play with your own custom fighters.
No other game features a character creator quite like 2K’s Creation Suite. There have been so many possibilities with the Creation Suite that people have made. From Hulk and Spiderman to other video game characters to wrestlers that weren’t in the roster – the possibilities are endless.
In addition to making your own characters, you can make your own arenas. Instead of playing as legends, you can be your own legend. MyCAREER mode allows you to rise through the ranks, fight after fight, from NXT to WWE, and eventually take your rightful spot in the WWE hall of fame.
In a brand new addition, you can outline your custom character’s personality through interviews once you become world famous. In an attempt to make the game as realistic as possible, 2K has added in three man commentary.
Featuring Michael Cole, John Layfield, and Jerry Lawler, this will add ultimate realism when you hear genuine WWE announcers calling out every move you make. If you preorder WWE 2K16, you get a really crazy bonus.
You get to play as Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Terminator. Yes, you can run around in the ring as the T-800 from both Terminator 1 and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. This is a bonus that makes pre ordering very worthwhile.
Below is details WWE 2K16 reviews wrote by an expert player:
“Just know I hate 2K marketing teams. They falsely advertised no duplication in the roster. This was almost enough to make me not buy. However, youtubers posted great gameplay and I had to add this to my collection. Im glad I did too, here is why:
1. Graphics look exactly like screenshots do. Very nice! Very clean!
2. Way faster and smoother than 2k15 for all movements. Strikes are way faster.
3. New barricade grapples make even a normal match down right brutal! You can even slam against the ring apron!
4. New irish whips causing opponents to fall violently to the floor, opposite of all other games where they just run endlessly.
5. New stamina exhaust animations. When you are tired you grapple slow and worn while breathing heavy! Much like ea ufc.
6. New seated positions add to brutality. You can sit opponents up and kick them in the neck, back, or face! It adds awsome mixups!
7.better ring out angles! You can now see your wrestler from all sides! No more blackout camera angles out of the ring. We finally have camera cuts!
8. Breakouts back from wwe raw 2 and this time its better than ever! You can attack whenever you want to, and if its a falls count anywhere battle as long as you want!
9.champions recognition! During matches that arent for the title, the announce team admires you by saying some pretty neat lines…despite a mostly bland commentary..this helps keep it fresh.
10. You can finally pin and submit in cage matches!!!
11.hell in a cell and steel cage structure drops down around superstars! It is just like real life as it lowers both guys stare down each other.
12. Hell in a cell revamped! You can now freely throw opponents into cell reg as regardless of possition! No more eye ranks!
13.create an arena! You can for the 1st time ever move the individual parts of your arena around! You can also add stage props like; strechers, cars, ladders, the statue of liberty..and a bit more.
14.no loading screens from the moment the entrance starts until you head back to the main menu! Just like ea ufc!
15.amazing soundtrack! The addition of updated superstar theme music adds a lot of depth in your experience! Like by alot!
Overall, this is the best wrestling game I have ever played! It bests out here comes the pain, raw 2, and most every other game! This is spectacular! If you listen to the bad reviews you will slap yourself to the floor and be robbing yourself of the greatest wrestling experience on any console!!!
I’ve been collecting wwe games for 13 years and nothing beats this by sheer realism! Seriously buy it, it will make any wrestling fan feel whole!!!

Real consumer rating 4.5/5 because of alternate attire glitch that renders characters invisible after the match. This is confirmed to be getting a fix as we speak by 2K..so when it does it will get an updated score then. Otherwise its perfect!”

The Taken King: Everything we know about the new expansion, from Oryx to bonus DLC

The Taken King will be adding new content across the whole game, from new enemies to areas, modes and weaponry, and can be purchased through a digital upgrade or two physical editions.
Bungie has just revealed major changes to how levelling, Factions and Quests will work, and has more to come in a series of weekly livestreams, continuing August 26. In preparation, here’s everything we know so far.
Everything you need to know about Destiny: The Taken King‘s new levelling, Factions, Exotic Blueprints and Quests
© Bungie
What is Destiny: The Taken King?

The Taken King is essentially the first major expansion to Destiny, marking the start of the game’s second year of content, following the game’s initial release in late 2014 and two expansions The Dark Below and House of Wolves.

It will include at one major new planet-sized area (the Dreadnaught), three new sub-classes, new story missions and narrative, new and remixed Strikes, a Raid, Crucible maps and modes, Patrol content, Exotic weaponry and quests, a new enemy type named The Taken and a higher level cap.

There will also be plenty of changes across how you access weapons, Bounties, Quests and more. For example, you can now hold up to 16 Bounties and redeem them without a Tower visit; see all missing and available Bounties and Exotic items in new Collections, and the game’s economy has been streamlined to a single Legendary Marks currency. © Activision

As well as new Strikes with “unique and dynamic new Boss battles”, according to Bungie, existing strikes Dust Palace, Undying Mind and Cerberus Vae III – which were previously PlayStation exclusive – will be updated with Taken enemy encounters.

It will also introduce a new levelling up system (detailed below) which will completely transform the end-game experience.

The Taken King will be available as a digital upgrade for those who already own all of Destiny‘s previous content for £40 / $40. It’ll also be available at retail for £55 / $55, which will include all of the game’s previous content, and a Collector’s Edition for £80 / $80, which includes a series of physical bonuses and bonus in-game content, which can be bought separately.

The release date for Destiny: The Taken King is September 15 worldwide on PS4, Xbox One, PS3 and Xbox 360. Destiny: The Taken King‘s level boost and levelling up system

With the release of The Taken King, experience earned by defeating enemies, completing missions and turning in bounties will now help you level up all the way to the new cap of 40. © Bungie
Everything you need to know about Destiny: The Taken King‘s new levelling, Factions, Exotic Blueprints and Quests

Light level – the stat that is currently given to characters post-level 20 – will remain, and is now a product of all your gear held on every character on your account and items inside your Vault. Bungie recommends you shouldn’t dismantle anything before The Taken King comes out, because it’ll all count!

Light is now a three-digit number. Instead of the previous 30% damage increase from one Light level to the next at the moment, it means that stat changes will be more granular in The Taken King.

Bungie’s Luke Smith reckons the old way of doing things left too much to chance. He said: “The conflation of gear and character level led to this place where your identity was determined by things outside of your control. We don’t want to do that.”

With an increased level cap of 40, and missions starting at a much higher level than casual players might be used to, each copy of The Taken King comes with a one-time level booster.

Players will receive one of these consumables per expansion – so choose your Guardian wisely – and can use it to bypass the grind and jump straight into those new story missions. Destiny: The Taken King‘s three new sub-classes

Each of the game’s classes will have a third sub-class as part of The Taken King, each with a new Super ability based on an element they’ve yet to have before. © Bungie
Hunter sub-class Nightstalker

The Hunter sub-class is Nightstalker. Described as more of a support class, its Super is a Void charged bow-and-arrow, which fires a projectile binding multiple enemies in place before exploding. © Bungie
Titan sub-class Sunbreaker

Titan’s new sub-class is the Sunbreaker, based around the Solar element. The Super sees a flaming Thor-like hammer that can be thrown at enemies, or used to leap forward towards them at high speed. © Bungie
Warlock sub-class Stormcaller

Warlock, meanwhile, has a sub-class based around Arc damage named Stormcaller, with the Super ability causing them to temporarily levitate off the ground and move around the map, allowing them to rain electricity down from above.

It’s been suggested that sub-classes won’t immediately unlocked at the start of The Taken King, with them being described as “lost arts” that Guardians must rediscover in order to match the threat from Oryx. Destiny: The Taken King story and lore: Who are Oryx and The Taken?

The main enemy of the new expansion is Oryx, an ancient Hive king born from The Darkness, who has come to our solar system on his Dreadnaught to seek revenge for Guardians killing his son Crota in expansion The Dark Below. © Bungie
Oryx, The Taken King’s central antagonist

With him comes a new enemy race, The Taken. This is essentially a possessed, remixed version of the game’s four enemy races, which have sucked into Oryx’s dimension and back into ours.

Possessed enemies will have different behaviours. For example, the Cabal Phalanx will now shoot energy from its shield when planted into the ground. Psions, meanwhile, will multiply if left undefeated. © Bungie
The Taken is a new enemy race in The Taken King

Community manager Eric Esborne teased they’ll impact other areas of the game, not just The Taken King‘s new content. He told us: “We can introduce this new enemy combatant race that will not only serve as the primary focal point as the story, but the rest of the game as well. You can deploy them pretty much anywhere and make an encounter feel different and unique. “They can attack the Cabal, or fight other groups, but they’re a mixture of existing enemy races with this new dark power.”

Describing their appearance, art director Michael Zak said: “We wanted to do something that retained elements of where the Taken came from, but that unified them. They’ve got this supernatural flame that’s burning them from the inside, and because we wanted to communicate their will being erased, they tend to have jitter in their animations and a tortured look to them.” The Taken King‘s setting: Oryx’s Dreadnaught and Phobos

Much of the expansion is to take place on a Dreadnaught operated by Oryx, who is the central antagonist of The Taken King. This is a ship that’s millions of years old, and will feature story missions, the Raid and Patrol missions. © Bungie
Dreadnaught concept art

Discussing the Dreadnaught, community manager Eric Esborne told Digital Spy: “Not only is it a new destination – we know players are going to love that, they’ll be going in there and to explore, fight new enemies and do new patrols, it’s also the thing that will pull you through the story – it’s the stage for all of our story missions, and also the place where you’ll get the fresh looks and the first looks at the end game. “We wanted it to be this big elaborate thing, this big fortress you’ll go back to and always have some new activities to see. It’s where we’re going to evolve that model as you transition out of the story and into the end game, it makes for a really cool set piece.”

The game starts with answering a distress signal from a Cabal base on Mars moon Phobos, which is thought to be the game’s second new area, though it could be just for a single mission. © Bungie
Dreadnaught concept art

It’s been teased that missions and Strikes could have Raid-style puzzles, with a trailer showing players running down corridors with shooting electricity. “Even in The House of Wolves and Dark Below, we introduced some Raid-like mechanics – some things we learned,” said community manager Eric Esborne. “We certainly don’t want to make our storytelling or story missions Raid difficulty, because you won’t be able to get through them.” New in Crucible modes and maps

Two new modes are confirmed for The Taken King – Mayhem and Rift – and three maps Bannerfall, Crossroads and Frontier. More modes are set to come.

First is Mayhem, which sees ability and Super energy meters recharge much faster than usual. “It’s essentially team deathmatch, but everything is turned up to 11,” said design lead Lars Bakken. © Bungie
Perform a backwards flip in Rift mode to earn extra points

Rift, meanwhile, is “Destiny‘s answer to capture the flag style objective mode” according to Bakken. Teams have to grab a ‘spark’ and take it to the enemy team’s rift. Points can be scored in two ways – with a regular dunk, and also a stylish backflip to net extra points. Peter Dinklage is no longer the voice of Destiny

Game of Thrones star Peter Dinklage – the man who famously uttered, “that wizard came from the moon” – will be replaced as the voice of Destiny by Nolan North.

Nolan North isn’t just voicing new dialogue for The Taken King, but will be re-recording dialogue for the entire game. © Getty Images / Albert L. Ortega
Nolan North is the new voice of Destiny

Wishing to put his own stamp on things, North didn’t listen to any of the older dialogue, choosing instead to record everything from scratch. “I specifically said I didn’t want to hear anything that someone else had done, so that I didn’t have some preconceived notion of what it has to be. Instead, I just gave it my stamp, and let them direct me accordingly,” he said.

North is hoping this will become an ongoing job, arguing that it would be great to “evolve Ghost as we move forward over the years”. Maybe he knows something we don’t. Destiny: The Taken King Collector’s Edition DLC, VIP bonuses and Red Bull DLC

Upon The Taken King‘s release, those who have bought both The Dark Below and House of Wolves expansions, or have reached level 30 within the game’s first year, will be given VIP items. Teased to be exclusive shaders, emblem and weapons, Bungie has said players “won’t ever” gain access beyond playing the game in its first year. © Bungie
Collector’s Edition bonuses
© Bungie
VIP Year 1 player rewards

As well as exclusive physical items, a Collector’s Edition of the game will offer some bonus in-game rewards, including class-specific emotes, armour shades and exotic class items with experience bonuses. After feedback from the users, these items will now be made available as downloadable content for $20.

Bungie have teamed up with Red Bull to offer a timed-exclusive “epic, new quest [that] is a never-before-seen, multi-stage mission”, with codes with each drink purchase providing access between September 18 until December 31, before being available to all from January 1. Meanwhile, from July 1, codes will give the Focused Light drop, which increases experience gains by 50% for half-an-hour at a time. Like last year, PlayStation players have access to timed-exclusive content until September 2017; a Vex-focused Strike named ‘The Echo Chamber’, Crucible map ‘Sector 618’, Exotic weapon Jade Rabbit and new gear sets for each of the game’s three classes.
Destiny: The Taken King trailers:
Destiny: The Taken King is available September 15 worldwide on PS4, Xbox One, PS3 and Xbox 360.

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We’ll find out more about Destiny: The Taken King very soon

Black Ops 3 guide: 7 tips for mastering Call of Duty's multiplayer beta 2017

The Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 multiplayer beta has only been out for a few days on PS4, but it’s clear even during these early stages that the competition this year is going to be fierce.
With a new movement system to master and specialist classes to get to grips with, those maps can be intimidating places for newbies, so we’ve pulled together a few tips and tricks to help beginners survive that little bit longer.
Everything you need to know about Black Ops 3 beta
1. Attack or defence? Choose your specialist and skills wisely
© Activision
The specialist soldiers and their abilities make for the biggest change in Black Ops 3, although you’ll have to earn and spend unlock tokens if you want to have all the skills at your disposal.
You can select from one of four specialists as you start the game – two more can be unlocked during the beta – and can equip one skill at a time. It’s highly recommended that you start out with a specialist and skill that suits your style of play.
If you’re new to the game, then Battery is a good choice, as she has Kinetic Armour that can deflect regular body shots. It’s a great ability for newbies getting used to maps, especially when you find yourself in wide open spaces, or are heading into a room where a battle is taking place.
© Activision
Outrider’s Vision Pulse, which reveals enemy locations within range, is a decent ability if you’re a slightly slower and more methodical player, while Ruin’s speed up ability and Prophet’s Glitch ability – which takes you back to a previous location – are handy for escaping hairy situations.
Once you’ve learned the maps and your kill counts go up, then it’s time to try the more attacking specialist skills.
2. Walk before you can run: Start off with a Team Deathmatch

The Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 beta contains seven game modes, including Team Deathmatch, Domination, Demolition, Kill Confirmed, Hardpoint, Capture the Flag and Search & Destroy.
© Activision
A tip that’s good for most multiplayer shooters is that you need to walk before you can run, so it’s best to stick to game modes like Team Deathmatch when you’re starting out.
Not only is it the most heavily populated of the game modes – which means you won’t be waiting as long in the lobbies – but Team Deathmatch is also the most straightforward.
It’s a kill or be killed experience where the only objective is to rack up the most points, which makes it ideal for learning the maps and getting used to the new movement system and specialist abilities.
If you think about maps as having two or three tiers, then move upwards and downwards from area to area – Evac is particularly good for this. Your constant movement will make you harder to kill, and coming in from different levels will surprise other players.
5. Don’t be afraid to get a little wet

Swimming is another new addition to Black Ops 3 multiplayer, and while there’s a useful stretch of water in Evac, Hunted is the best map to visit if you want to learn how to use swimming to your advantage.
While you can easily find yourself embroiled in an underwater gunfight, for the most part it’s a really useful way to sneak around the map and surprise your enemies.
© Activision
Hunted’s pool of water can pretty much take you anywhere you need to go, leading to the cave, the inside of the house and the courtyard with the overturned vehicle – the latter of which is a good place to emerge to catch stragglers.
6. Stay close to your teammates

Even though Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 is a team-based game, you don’t necessarily have to run with a crew to have success.
However, with all of the new skills and abilities we’ve discussed, you’d do well to stick close to a higher level player when you start out.
Not only is there a good chance that they’ll protect you from getting shot – and you’ll be more aware when danger’s afoot – but you’ll discover new routes through the maps and innovative new ways to use your skills.
© Activision
7. Don’t get disheartened and keep on trying

Remember, most of the people who populate the Black Ops 3 beta are already massive Call of Duty fans who have pre-ordered the game.
Don’t get disheartened if you’re struggling to rack up those kills – keep on trying new things and experimenting with different abilities, and you’ll soon find something that works for you.
Black Ops 3 is coming to PS4, Xbox One, PS3, Xbox 360 and PC on November 6.

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FURI REVIEW

 It’s advanced Bop-It, a lighting quick series of rock-paper-scissors, the Grand Finals in fly-swatting—Furi exercises the hell out of a very small set of abilities until they feel like they were always there.
Flock of Samurai
You can slash, parry, shoot, and dash from the first minute, and holding each action’s button charges that move (parry is the only exception), which makes them more powerful at the cost of slower movement. It’s a fun combat system that rewards taking risks and encourages close study of the enemy’s offense in order to perfect timing. The soundtrack is lovely company for all the hard work I put in, a moody, synth-heavy score that spells intrigue and excitement in John Carpenter’s language.
Every boss is a remix of similar challenges that test your mastery of these controls and consist of several phases, marked by depleting a block of the boss’s health bar. Phase one will always be the easiest, introducing the boss’s combat leaning—some focus on bullet hell attacks, others on swordplay, stealth, and so on.
There’s a chance for redemption in Furi’s story, which goes further and hit me harder than I expected it to.
Takashi Okazaki of Afro Samuraidesigned Furi’s characters, each a distinct expression of their thematic and mechanical style and coupled with a name that wouldn’t be out of place in a Metal Gear game. The Strap is a prisoner like you—literally strapped to a sci-fi Segway—who lashes out in desperation, spraying bullets in erratic patterns and attacks anything that makes a sound (which can be exploited). The Hand is a noble turquoise knight with a green sword of light that prefers closer, intimate combat. His sword chunks off health in thirds and he can deflect bullets, so I had to get cozy with my katana. They’re all mysterious, creative characters with close ties to the Stranger, whose questionable intentions are reflected in how they talk to him. Turns out you’re not a great guy, being in celestial prison and all, but there’s a chance for redemption in Furi’s story, which goes further and hit me harder than I expected it to.
To start, bosses bust out a few basic attacks that hint at what’s to come—whittle them down enough and you’ll typically enter a short melee bout before the next phase begins proper. These lock the two combatants to a small circle where the focus shifts from bullet dodging to more complex combinations of melee parries and quick AoE attacks. The path to success is playing defensively, waiting for the enemy to attack, reading it within a second, and punishing: the brief glint of an incoming melee attack can be parried, AoE attacks require a series of quick dodges around red cones of indication, and sometimes it’s a dangerous mix of the two (and more). After committing a boss’s attack signposts to memory, Furi becomes a meditative game, where I focus entirely on the action and react in what feels like an inhuman way—a near perfect emulation of the main character’s mentality.
I wasn’t an expert from the get-go (who in Bop-It is?) so my health bar often depleted before the boss’s. But that’s not an instant death. Failure means you lose one of three opportunities to finish that section. Lose all three, and you start from phase one. Finish a boss phase to refill your health bar and get one life back. It’s a nice rhythm of give and take that gives you ample time to learn a phase’s attacks without throwing you into the next one empty handed. It’s necessary padding for when Furi fails to prepare you for its rare bugs and bewildering final phases.
Final daze
During the hardest battle of the game for me, a wall spawned beneath my character, where he got stuck and died. It was my best run at the boss after trying for an hour, so I felt like melting and dissolving into the sky. In my seven hours of play, it was the only major bug I encountered, but in a game that depends on precision, such a small blunder can knock the wind out of you. When I finally hit the final stage a barrage of unexpected laser waves and bullet walls flew in from every direction. It’s a combination of attacks not telegraphed in the boss’s prior phases, and a poor final ‘test’. Starting the entire fight over several times just for an attempt to figure out the final phase nearly broke me.
 At least there's a little time to cool off between grueling fights while you walk to the next gate, traversing each prison plane’s distinct biome. There’s a massive red desert with bulky pipes worming in and out of the surface, a topsy-turvy series of zen garden islands of magenta sand, and a verdant oasis where you’re given the option to rest for eternity (I rudely declined). You’re free to wander these interstitial scenes while Rabbit Man seethes with anger and eggs you on. The camera changes often and dramatically, making control a challenge. ‘Forward’ in one shot might mean left in another. Luckily, I figured out how to enable auto-walk by pressing A, but only through frustrated button-mashing. The scenes are a calming, contemplative counter to Furi’s always-on combat, and a nice break to soak in the story and atmosphere. I wish there was a bit more in terms of how the Stranger is characterized—it’s only done through others’ dialogue and slight environmental clues, but there’s enough to figure he’s a troubled man with a tragic arc. It’s subtle storytelling that relies more on Furi’s bold stylings to communicate rather than spoken word.

And Furi is at its best when it stacks up these big blocks of distilled style—canted camera angles, colorful vistas that fisheye into the horizon, glassy synth pump-up jams, bonkers anime adversaries with funky clothes and a few mysterious one-liners—and converts the sticky-sweet excess into adrenaline, tension, and confidence through its simple, challenging combat system. It’s a great action game with a few potent hang ups that’ll rightfully push impatient players away, but one that expresses the Stranger’s burning anger through sustained, controlled intensity rather than hokey, explosive set pieces.

THE TELLTALE SERIES: EP 1 REVIEW

“So, what are we thinking: modern art or hanging light fixture?” I’m asking two friends about which way we should severely concuss a man. We spent the last five minutes curating Batman’s not-so-subtle entrance into Falcone’s skyscraper headquarters using a drone, and every method involves tossing people into (sometimes through) solid surfaces. Afterwards, in typical Telltale A-or-B fashion, we get the moral choice to brutalize an important character or not. I hardly know what it even means anymore, but no matter, this is Batman’s secret vocabulary, and Telltale’s interpretation of the character is as hazy as ever. You position Bruce Wayne through dialogue choices and pivotal decisions against the same inconsistent moral question Batman has always faced: how far should vigilante justice go? It must at least go into and through modern art, I suppose.
Unfortunately, episode one of Telltale’s story-driven adventure game—where dialogue choices and quicktime punching sequences make up the bulk of the action—doesn’t have time to address Batman or Bruce Wayne’s character in full, shifting most of the focus onto setting up a story that digs into Wayne’s origins—and no, I’m not talking about his parents’ murder. They go deeper. The result is a domestic comic book story that does little to change the Telltale formula, but might change Batman’s. You’ll see no crocodile men here, just gangsters and politicians and quick time events.
Comic hook

The setup is is fairly simple: Harvey Dent is running for Mayor, and Bruce Wayne is backing him. Notorious crime lord Carmine Falcone arrives at their fundraising party as a public supporter of Dent, and Bruce can choose to take umbrage with that or not. We kicked his ass to the curb, worried that keeping close ties to a notorious criminal might tarnish Dent’s and Wayne’s reputation. Meanwhile, in an earlier scuffle with Catwoman, Batman recovered some supposedly valuable data that’s taking a while to decrypt. Several parties, a few unknown, are fighting for control of the data, because a harrowing truth hides within. One that may change how Wayne thinks about himself, his duty and limits as Batman, and those he formerly considered enemies—the revelation (and my attention) just comes right at the tail end of the episode.

TOTAL WAR: WARHAMMER - CALL OF THE BEASTMEN REVIEW

While friends at university went to parties and pretended to like drum and bass, I was reading about Beastmen on the Warhammer website. It was easy to visualise sunless forests full of monsters, crowding around profane monuments, but the tabletop game only captured the moment they emerged from the woods to attack. The Call of the Beastmen DLC lets you experience all the supplementary stuff that makes the race so interesting—plotting, raiding, stamping on dead humans—and in doing so, gives us an expansion that feels truly different to play.
Because you’re controlling a horde, you never have to worry about defending settlements. The constant movement makes more sense here than it ever has before, because the Beastmen are a hit and run army. I pissed off a collection of factions on the Grand Campaign, who united and chased me, Benny Hill-style, right into the northern wastes. I waited until they were ravaged by attrition, frozen and depleted, before picking them off individually. That’s why it feels so refreshing. You never need fret about the fringes of your empire—just how you’ll escape unscathed.
It’s terribly satisfying looking back and seeing scorched earth where settlements once stood, but there are downsides. The Eye for an Eye campaign ends when Khazrak the One Eye’s warherd is destroyed, so you have to be cautious. But far from being a criticism, this is another element that forces you to play in character. You’re a guerilla force. When you’re not on the warpath, you need to stay concealed, scrambling along hidden roads and setting up camps where humans fear to tread. Beast-paths work like the Dwarven Underway, letting you move through impassable terrain unimpeded—think of them like public bridleways, but instead of bumping into cagouled ramblers you’re more likely to be trampled into the filth by a stinking herd of monsters. It’s another smart implementation of lore hidden in ancient army books—throwaway paragraphs turned into essential game mechanics. Grandiose dwarven halls have never seemed so far away.
Your economy also works in a different way, in the sense that you don’t have one. Your income comes from raiding and razing, and this forces you to stay mobile and find fresh lands to despoil. I love the feeling of ranging into rich enemy settlements, ruining everything, then slipping back into the forest to the sound of wailing children and pounding hooves. It’s tricky to balance at times—there are no fat gold mines to boost your finances—so you rely on buffs provided by the lunar cycle. If there’s anything more bestial than using moon-magic to swell your dark forces, I’d love to know what it is.
Momentum is important because it lets you summon Brayheards. These work in a similar way to the Orc Waaaagh! They appear when your bestial rage builds to the required level, and you can send them to attack specific targets. They’re incredibly powerful, to the point that I didn’t feel I’d earned such an effective boon. If you’re a meticulous Total War planner who takes the time to compose the perfect army, it might feel like a shortcut, but it helps give the race character. You build rage by constantly harassing, raiding and fighting—all the things that make me hate AI factions—so you can’t help but feel like a delicious menace.
The sense of racial distinction continues on the battleground. The Beastmen are an army of pace and brutality. Many of your units get vanguard deployment, so the plan is always to outmanoeuvre, surprise and destroy. Battles of attrition rarely succeed. Beastman units struggle against the specialist troops of the later game, so location and circumstance are paramount. That’s why the repetition of the ambush location is disappointing. Your standard army stance on the campaign map gives you the opportunity to surprise enemy forces, meaning every ambush takes place in the same bleak setting. I hate auto-resolving important engagements—the beauty of Total War’s scale and detail is that I get to see Karl Franz chased from the map by angry mutant pigs—but it’s tempting when you’re seeing the same location for the 20th time. The Eye for an Eye campaign itself is also quietly underwhelming. The feud between Beastman leader Khazrak the One Eye and Middenland’s Boris Todbringer never gathers enough momentum to be as compelling as the rivalries that occur organically in every Total War game. It’s still great fun, but I got a better sense of place and character from playing Beastmen in the Grand Campaign.
The price might seem steep for a new race, but they do change the game. I got around eight hours play out of the Eye for an Eye campaign, and it made me start a new Grand Campaign, too. Ten hours into that, and I'm still enjoying it. I'm biased because I love Beastmen, but they're still a fun, worthwhile addition to the vanilla game.

Call of the Beastmen will satisfy anyone looking to enrich the vanilla Warhammer experience with a distinct army. The Warhammer fluff tells us every forest in the Old World is teeming with Beasts of Chaos—heck, some of us even wasted our uni years reading about it—and this DLC embodies that assurance with savage detail.

ABZÛ REVIEW

This giant squid isn’t the kind of kraken who’d take down a ship or duke it out with Moby Dick. Still, it’s huge, roughly three times my length from tip to tentacle. Its massive glassy eyes look me up and down. They’re as big as a pancakes with pupils like balled fists. I’m getting sized up by an intelligent, curious creature. Something I heard on a science doc years back floats up, ‘Take it out of the water and their eyes deflate like limp plastic grocery bags.’ Be well, giant squid.
We swim together for a minute, and then I do a little somersault to signal I’m off. The squid doesn’t seem to care and continues to do cool squid stuff, which is fine. But for a moment, I was up close with an impressive, abstract being, thinking about what it might be thinking about. I wasn’t worried about solving puzzles or a health bar or where to go next—I was only concerned with swimming and seeing and understanding, a major accomplishment.
Underwater journey
Abzû is an expertly directed psychedelic marine tour without a single UI or text prompt telling you where to go or what to do, purely driven by curiosity. You play as a nameless diver with an infinite lung capacity (or no lungs at all) where you move on a linear path from one big underwater environment to the next at your own leisure. You might have to pull a lever here and you’re encouraged to steer clear of certain objects later on, but your progress is never gated by puzzles or actual danger. Go on, take that shark for a ride. You’re invincible.
With no clear, pressing goals, Abzû is about movement and observation, and enables both in expansive, satisfying ways. You’re encouraged to do as divers do and thoroughly explore each vibrant ocean environment, populated with actual creatures from the marine biosphere.
I reenacted the iconic scene from Free Willy with my orca pals, tried to hug a giant squid, and did a barrel roll on a humpback whale through a torrential cyclone of silvery fish.
I never want to stop moving because swimming feels so great. The diver cuts through the water, frictionless and easy to control. One button does a powerful dolphin kick, propelling the diver forward, and another, arguably one of my favorite button assignments in a while, performs a somersault in whatever direction you’re pressing. You never need to use it, but it’s a flourish that encourages movement for the sake of it. Whether turning a corner in a jetstream or just trying to chain together two consecutive flips to impress the dolphins, throwing a somersault in at the right time is a satisfying way to maintain momentum while feeling and looking cool. I wish there were more frivolous maneuvers to play with, but swimming, in combination with exploration, is fun enough as is.
I lingered in the environments for a long time, following schools of fish to get a better look, piggybacking a hungry grouper, or trying to keep pace with a manta ray fleet. I skirted the sandy floor, looking for skittish octopi and bright blue lobsters. I reenacted the iconic scene from Free Willy with my orca pals, tried to hug a giant squid, and did a barrel roll on a humpback whale through a torrential cyclone of silvery fish. They dynamically parted around us, spinning off in erratic patterns, and returned to their flashy tornado. It’s one of the most beautiful, bizarre things I’ve done in a game, and it felt like my idea. Feel free to use it.
Environments can look comically overloaded with life, but we’re meant to see the ecosystem squished tight and exploding with color. They’re microcosms of a larger system, signifying an ideal abundance and exchange of energy—a pretty perpetual motion machine. Deeper environments turn down the brightness in exchange for mood, scarcity, and stranger creatures, but the sense of wonder never left me.

To really soak it in, you can ‘meditate’ on statues in each environment, which let you leave the perspective of the diver and use the camera to select any present organism to follow them around for a bit. It’s an easy way to observe the individual animations and behaviors of the dozens of species a single area might have, and the camera follows the food chain. If you’re watching a small fish while a bigger fish snaps it up, the perspective will then shift to the big fish. If a hungry shark comes along, the camera chain continues. It’s like bouncing around in a psychedelic marine documentary—all that’s missing is some Attenborough. But in place of David’s narration, the journey is elevated by an amazing score from Austin Wintory.