Top 5 Xbox/Xbox 360 Games #1

Halo 2

The game that takes the top spot on my list is none other than Halo 2 by Bungie. Halo 2 was released on November 9th, 2004 for the Xbox platform and went on to receive very impressive scores and reviews from the Internets' top gaming websites. Halo 2 also went on to be a major player in the eSports world due to the multiplayer game modes and gameplay.

The campaign was a vast story that went on for hours as you take up the mantles of both master chief and a member of the covenant elite known as the Arbiter. I have never been that big of a campaign player but this game hooked me from the very beginning and I am pleased to say that I completed the story.

The crowned jewel of this game ended up being the multiplayer. Playing team deathmatch on Lockout is where I spent most of my time while playing this game. Halo 2 was the ultimate game for Xbox to showcase the Xbox Live functionality. Being able to play games with or against anyone in the world helped bring out the strength of this FPS.

The different maps offered players close combat or long range fighting along with some hidden surprises like super jumping. While customization was limited to emblems, for the time that the game was out, that helped players feel unique to their character.

Halo 2 is also a great LAN game because there could be up to 16 players in a lobby with four different Xbox consoles in the area.

Halo 2 was the game I played throughout my high school years and I am sad that the servers for the game are closed so online play can no longer be accessed. One of the greatest FPS games in history and in my opinion, the greatest Xbox game ever made.

Top 5 Xbox/Xbox 360 Games #2

While I have mentioned in a previous article that I am not a fan of yearly franchises I do believe that Call of Duty is worthy of two spots on this countdown. This version of the Call of Duty franchise is widely believed to have the biggest skill cap between veterans of the series and those that are new. Call of Duty Black Ops was produced by Treyarch with modes such as single player campaign, multiplayer and zombies. The multiplayer mode gameplay was quite a shock because of the differences from the games previous entries.

Quickscoping was no longer at the forefront like previous entries so the gameplay was more gun to gun focused. Black Ops also spawned perhaps the greatest multiplayer map of the Call of Duty franchise in Nuketown. The maps are varied between small fast paced gameplay and larger map that promote more long range firefights. This game provided me with many hours of action filled gameplay that didn't involve cheap deaths due to lucky panic sniping.

Another huge part of this game was the return of Nazi zombies and the possibilities that lie within the mode. Grabbing some friends and trying to make it as far as possible was one of the most fun things ever provided by a game.

This will always be my favorite entry in the Call of Duty franchise because it put the focus back on gun fights and included some of the most fun maps such as Nuketown and Firing Range. Treyarch will be back in Fall 2015 with Black Ops 3 pushing their gameplay to a futuristic setting.

Interview with Andrey 'Reynad' Yanyuk

Tempo Storm team owner Andrey 'Reynad' Yanyuk

On April 6th I was fortunate enough to have Andrey 'Reynad' Yanyuk answer some questions about his eSports company Tempo Storm and his thoughts on Blizzard's card game Hearthstone. I was very appreciative that he took the time to do this so I thought I would share the answers he provided to my questions.

Me: What led you into trying out Hearthstone?

Reynad:  I played poker and MtG professionally since the age of 14, and saw the potential it had on twitch the first day closed beta began. On the second day I managed to get a key, and worked from there

Me: What do you think brought about your success in the game and streaming?

Reynad: I had my finger on the pulse of Twitch and TCGs, so when Hearthstone came along I could see its potential and get in early. My skill set gave me the opportunity to have a "pro player" role in the scene, but it's not as important. Even without the skill set, I could have been involved in other ways (tournament hosting, casting, etc)

Me: What made you want to start your own team and be the first player/owner in Hearthstone?

Reynad:  I was getting big offers from every major eSports organization and started to think about the longevity of streaming as a career. For all I knew it could all disappear within a year, so i had to take the opportunity to make something out of my popularity that could pay the bills long term. Signing with a team would just have been a way of cashing in more during the time I was popular.

Me: What has been the most rewarding part about owning your team?

Reynad: Watching my teammates win is very rewarding. It's also rewarding when people ask to buy merchandise, cheer on Tempo Storm players in Heroes of the Storm, Counter Strike, or Fighting Games. It shows that people are fans of the brand, and not just me as a streamer personally.

Me: How was the decision to branch out into other competitive eSport games made?

Reynad: The end goal for Tempo Storm is to have as much brand recognition as possible, and branching outside of Hearthstone is necessary to make that happen. Everyone who follows Hearthstone as an esport is aware of Tempo Storm at this point. We need people in other esports markets to know the name too.

Me: Where do you see Tempo Storm going from here now that you have a Heroes of the Storm team and a newly signed Street Fighter Pro?

Reynad: We're going to focus more on content generation for the various communities, and getting our name out is as many ways as possible.

Me: Has being the owner of Tempo Storm made you think about giving up playing Hearthstone ala OpTic NaDeSHoT?

Reynad:  I've thought about it since a month after I became popular. Hearthstone is fun enough when I'm not forced to play it when I don't want to, but at some point it will start happening less and less. Professional Hearthstone is unique in that I could stop playing for 5 years and be just as good when I came back, so constant practice isn't necessary to compete at the highest level. This, along with my ego, makes me continue to play tournaments. It also let's me get out into the real world more often and travel.

Me: Where do you see Hearthstone headed now that we are mid release of Blackrock Mountain?

Reynad: It will continue to slowly grow until the mobile release, at which point I expect it to explode in popularity.

Me: What has been your favorite deck to play in Hearthstone?

Reynad: Flood Mage was pretty fun, but I also enjoy playing Handlock and the oldest versions of Tempo Rogue quite a bit (before they nerfed every card in rogue).

Me: And finally, any big announcements coming from Tempo Storm in the near future?

Reynad: They'll happen when they happen, but there are always big announcements on the horizon :)

And with that thank you very much to Andrey for taking the time to answer my questions and like everyone else I will be eagerly awaiting to see where Tempo Storm goes next in the eSports scene. 

Additionally, Reynad and Tempo Storm will be competing in the SeatStory Cup III from April 9th through April 12th.

Top 5 Xbox/Xbox 360 Games

Number 3

One of the most fun games I have ever played came out on October 17th, 2008 for the Xbox 360, Windows PC, and Mac. Taking place after the zombie apocalypse, four survivors are on a journey to find a place where the infected do not run rampant. There is the standard single player campaign mode but this game is steered towards multiplayer fun and excitement. Multiplayer campaign mode is the shining light of this game while other modes such as survival and the versus modes are all entertaining in their own right.

While the game is several years old and there is an expansion, there is a following that remains faithful to this game and continues to play it religiously. There are modded servers that allow for some hilarious character selections such as a sofa and map customization's like adding random staircases anywhere in the map. 

Many fans are hoping for a Left 4 Dead 3 to come out someday and there are rumors that the game is in production. 

So with all that,

Pills here!

My Top 5 Xbox/Xbox360 Games Continued...

Number 4

Up next on the list we have Mortal Kombat Deception, an Xbox game that was released on October 4, 2004. MK Deception is a fighting game that relies heavily on extravagant finishing moves and blood splattering abilities. The single player is known as Konquest Mode which follows a young man named Shujinko who searches for the Kamidogu at the bequest of an emissary of the elder gods. I absolutely loved this story mode and I have always hated single player modes. It really gets you into the whole story and it continues on from the previous installment of the Mortal Kombat franchise, Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance.

The multiplayer is what you would expect from a fighter except for the big amounts of blood and gore (especially from the death traps). What makes the Mortal Kombat series unique is the presence of fatalities and exclusive to this game hara-kiri. Fatalities are unique to each character and performed after you have won the match that allow your character to perform a brutal killing move. Hara-Kiri on the other hand allows a player to commit a character specific suicide rather than have a fatality committed on them. 

My personal favorite part of this game has got to be the mini games that you can do by yourself or have other people at the system join you. The main new mini game that I thought was fantastic was Chess Kombat (See the trend with K?) where you choose characters and play chess with taking pieces equaling fighting actual matches. Overall this is my favorite Mortal Kombat game and my favorite fighting game and I highly recommend it to everyone! (18 & up as it is rated M)

Top 5 Xbox/Xbox 360 Games IMO

Number 5

Obviously from the title you can see that I am kicking off things with a game from a series I was arguing against in the previous blog entry and this will not be the last entry from the Call of Duty series, I can promise you that! Unfortunately this game's online multiplayer mode is virtually unplayable with almost every lobby being modded. If you can manage to get a modder free lobby then holy cow get ready for some fun! This is around the time that the Call of Duty franchise really started taking off in popularity and online multiplayer first person shooters were gaining traction. 

What made this game so special in my opinion? A few things, starting with how simple the game was to pick up and understand to play. One of the best features World At War had was the boot camp mode where new players could face off in multiplayers so they don't feel overmatched against more seasoned veterans. There was really only one overpowered weapon (I'm looking at you MP40) and one overpowered perk (Juggernaut sucks) which made the game fairly balanced. Did I mention unscoped sniper rifles?! My personal favorite type of gun in all Call of Duty games. Not only was the multiplayer experience fantastic but this was the game that introduced the ever popular Nazi Zombies mode to the Call of Duty franchise. Those two things I have had endless hours of fun with and still bring me back to the game from time to time.

The Kar98k. My favorite weapon in Call of Duty World at War

Yearly Gaming Franchises...is it Time to End?

Is It Time?

As the the end of August came and passed the next installment of the storied Madden Football franchise hit shelves and with that a bunch of questions came up as to whether another edition of the game was needed. This does not only apply to the Madden franchise but also Call of Duty games (and yes I know the companies take turns each year) and basically every sport has a yearly entry. So my question is, why are we paying all this money each year for a game that is basically a roster update with minimal changes? I have been as guilty as anyone buying Call of Duty every year and only recently stopped getting the new Madden games that come out. I know this is a money making business for Activision and Electronic Arts but this is getting more tired than Jadeveon Clowney looked against UNC last week.

Time to retire at the top like Barry

I may be wrong in thinking this but don't all these games feel recycled to everyone? It seems like in Madden's case that all it adds is a new tackle animation and up to date rosters each year with their new product. And as for Call of Duty it's just new maps, same recycled guns and maybe a new game-type. Activision is just releasing its new engine for the Call of Duty games that fans have been asking for them to come out with for years. There have been no monumental changes for any of these franchises for years and that is unlikely to change even with the release of the new systems and it really is disappointing. The only way to change the companies from releasing sub par yearly content is to stop buying it which judging from the sales numbers is a sheer impossibility.

If the companies could come to a compromise and release a game every lets say two years that would be much more manageable for everyone. They would have more time to develop new features and consumers would be able to save the price of the game every other year. So with all that I still do think that it is time to throw in the towel and retire these every year franchises or at least slow their pace.