Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 has unveiled another clan that we will see in the upcoming RPG; the Ventrue Clan. The Ventrue are also known as the modern-day architects of the vampire world, and are, of course, full-blooded. Similarly to the Toreador clan in their influence over society, though, the Ventrue are known for their aristocracy rather than arty tendencies. They infiltrate the lives of the people they need to puppet, and bend them to the Ventrue's will. Modern-day Seattle is a power-grabbing territory, with each clan looking to solidify themselves as number one. The Clan of Kings once wanted to create an independent power structure, but so far, nothing has come of that idea. Some members of the Ventrue clan even joined others, such as the Camarilla, in their attempt to bring the dream to life. The Ventrue relies on manipulation and mind control for their disciplines, which is how they interact with the world around them. Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 Ventrue Clan disciplines: Dominate gives the Venture the ability to dominate the actions and memories of others. * Mesmerise: Primary Dominate power. Allows the Ventrue to place someone in a brief trance, ignoring sound, touch, and pain, and is oblivious to the world. * Command: Secondary Dominate power. Extends the control over the affected Mesmerised person, and can be ordered to move, move obstacles, or attack others. Fortitude gives the Ventrue true physical resilience. * Absorb: First active power of Fortitue. Ventrue is able to deflect all attacks that they can see, healing their wounds, by taking a defensive stance. * Personal Armor: Second active power. The Ventrue are able to shield their skin by hardening it to a stone-like barrier. Can also be upgraded to cause stagger from the recoil of opponents' strike. Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 is shaping up to be an incredible title. It releases next year, on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.

Looking at Metacritic, 2018’s Red Dead Redemption 2 sits at a near-perfect 97%, for both the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions. The original Red Dead Redemption comes in just below that at 95% on both consoles. I’d argue that, objectively, both those scores are too high, but one thing is certain, the original Red Dead Redemption is still a better game than its sequel. It took awhile for the initial circle-jerk of glowing reviews to die down, a time during which anyone who rated the game less than 80% had hordes of angry commentators descend on their site - hordes who had not yet played the game. Slant Magazine infamously awarded the game a 7/10 (I’d probably score it 7.5 in retrospect) and ended up gaining considerable exposure and notoriety from its direct competitors, as they reported on the angry backlash. For all the pre-launch hype and myriad of feature pieces published right after launch, Red Dead Redemption 2 quickly disappeared from the news feeds, and now we only see occasional updates for the underwhelming – and I’d argue self-limiting – Red Dead Online. Returning to Metacritic, the user reviews (while inherently untrustworthy) align with the press review scores for the original Red Dead Redemption, yet sit 20-30% percent lower than the critics average for the sequel. For all its flaws, Red Dead Redemption 2 still has some incredible moments that the first game can't come close to matching. Like so many other writers who have tentatively emerged to criticise aspects of the game, I’ll also start off with a quick recap of what Read Dead Redemption 2 does well, very well; just in case anyone thinks I somehow missed these aspects over 60 hours of play. For one, the scope of the world, overall plot, and individual characters arcs is unmatched outside of pure RPGs and, even then, it’s often better written. The way in which NPCs and gang members respond to your ongoing actions and key mission events is both organic and believable. Next up is the massive world, which makes key locations and the space between them feel believable and grounded in reality, however, each location is still packed with fine details. Finally, there’s every aspect of the presentation – from the visuals and animations, to the music and voice-acting – which set a new bar for what we could expect from a console game (though we subsequently discovered the human cost). But now, onto the issues I feel make the original game a better experience: Awful pacing This could apply to quite a few elements but I’m sticking to the narrative. I’ll never forget how unhappy people were when they found out you could push through the core Red Dead Redemption story in just 15 hours. Fifteen hours into Red Dead Redemption 2 – somewhere near the end of Chapter 2 (of six, ignoring the two-part epilogue) – I could only wish for such a reprieve. Aside from an early train robbery and the oft-lauded bar visit with Lenny, little of importance happens until the end of Chapter 3 and, even then, the pace drops off again until the end of Chapter 4 (which will put you at over 30 hours of gameplay by that point, assuming you do no optional activities). It's only at that point the pace finally picks up and maintains it, leading up to the conclusion of Arthur's story in Chapter 6. There are 3-hour movies so enthralling they go by in the blink of an eye, and there are insufferable 80-minute movies that feel like they drag on forever. Read Dead Redemption 2 falls into the latter category - though at least the ending was satisfying and it was peppered with great moments. The first game may have had a shorter narrative arc and less complex character development, but the slow start on the MacFarlane Ranch ramps up the assault on Fort Mercer; a desperate escape to Mexico culminates in supporting a rebel force overthrow a corrupt government; your return to Blackwater finally introduces Dutch and builds up to his literal fall. All three of these acts are 5-6 hours long apiece, full of excellent character interactions and pertinent moments, and combined, they told an excellent Western tale of revenge and redemption. Read Dead Redemption 2 would have worked well as a 30-hour core narrative but drags on for way, way too long. I’d argue a good part of this is simply the excessively long rides between your camp and mission locations (and sometimes the ride back). Sure, there’s plenty of dialogue that expands upon the history of Dutch’s gang, but it can’t hide the fact you spend a lot of time just tapping the gallop button and half of any mission is just travel time. The super-slow opening sequence sets the tone for the rest of the game. Restrictive gameplay When you’re not on a mission - and rather hunting for pelts, fishing, searching for hidden stranger missions, or completing random encounters on the trail – the open world feels vast and immersive. However, as soon as a mission starts, you’re locked into a tightly-scripted sequence of events (many of which are, sure, cinematic and exciting) and given a restricted path to follow through the world. Assaulting a plantation house or holding out in a bank after a robbery gone wrong? Best not try flank your enemies and approach from the rear unless explicitly told to do so. Chasing down a target on horseback? Make damn sure you stay directly behind them – with the game often reigning in your speed for dialogue purposes – and never deviate of the path to try cut them off prematurely. It’s far less blatant then the “return to the combat zone” messages in Call of Duty of Medal of Honor but the impact is the same. The first game shared these design flaws but a) it would drop the dialogue when you got into the thick of the action, rather than deliberately slow you down, and b) it came out in 2010. The second issue is the presence of poorly thought out mechanics. The first issue is the two-weapon limit and the need to always select your gear from the satchel on your horse (the game loves defaulting you to a pair of pistols for no apparent rhyme or reason). Realistic? Yes. Annoying? As ****. Why they would spend so much time and effort recording dialogue to remind the player to equip weapons baffles me? Why not just remove the stupid limitation and bring back the weapon wheel from the first game? The third, and most egregious issue, is the lack of any effective fast-travel mechanism for hours (a real pain in the arse given the aforementioned size of the world), and you might miss this option for much longer if you don’t upgrade your camp facilities in the right order. In the first game, not only was the world smaller and easier to navigate, you could set up a campfire just about anywhere and pick a fast-travel location. Why this was dropped in Red Dead Redemption 2, I’ll never understand. I guess I'm glad the cinematic camera was an option but could we not just skip the rest of the trip after essential dialogue was spoken? Archaic controls I could cynically argue that Rockstar games have never had good controls, from the wonky driving and on-foot brawls in the top-down classics, to the stiff movement and aiming from the PS2 era, to the ridiculous RAGE engine physics of the recent games that love to send you comically flying off your horse or stumbling over the environment. Combat has always been more functional than thrilling, and there's a reason every Rockstar game from the last two decades has included lock-on aiming (and, of course, the Dead Eye mode in Red Dead Redemption). As a fan of the original Red Dead Redemption, my problem is not that the controls are wonky, rather the they've barely advanced in over five years (using GTA V as the last reference point). Then Rockstar proceeded to add another contextual layer on top. At times, these contextual controls will fight for dominance with the combat controls, resulting in far too many situations during which I’d holster my weapons or break from cover mid-combat (which could mean certain death in some scenes). In populated cities, there were times I’d lock-on and tackle NPCs, rather than simply greeting them. Greeting the storekeeper didn't go as planned... Overlong animations Holy **** does this game take its time when performing any action – outside of perhaps the shooting itself. You walk around the gang camp and building interiors slower than an octogenarian with a Zimmer frame. Any contextual action involving grooming or feeding Arthur (and/or your horse) requires a 3 to 5-second animation. Looting a body? Expect a 3-second animation that'll probably reward you with a pocket watch worth a few cents at a local store (then extrapolate this activity to an entire outlaw camp of the recently deceased). Successfully hunted an an animal? Expect a 5-second animation that has you both cutting into and stripping the hide. The first game had these animations, but they were far simpler, shorter, and got you back into the action in a heartbeat. To the best of my knowledge, they’re entirely unskippable in the sequel (unless you’re shot or bumped midway through). Again, this game launched in 2018, and where did they find playtesters that didn’t find these animations overlong and consistently breaking the flow of gameplay? The only lengthy animations I'll tolerate are those that involve petting animals. So, there you have it, my issues with the sequel and why I feel Red Dead Redemption is still the better game. Feel free to argue below as to why criticising the glacial narrative pacing is infringing on artistic integrity; or why the crappy controls and tedious gameplay mechanics are there to generate immersion – or at least as much immersion as one can glean while watching your horse auto-ride to a destination and browsing YouTube for 10 minutes.

For anyone wondering what 2019’s Call of Duty entry was, a string of rumors and leaks first began as early as last year, with all signs seemingly pointing to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4. Now, we have valid confirmation from Kotaku editor Jason Schreier, who has been thoroughly accurate in the past regarding leaks. Schreier corroborated a claim from another user, LongSensation, on Twitter, claiming that the next title in the Call of Duty series would simply be called Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. Schreier confirmed this, humorously pointing out that the first game in the series was called Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and 2019’s entry is simply titled Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. I can confirm this is true, and that it's hilarious. The first one was "Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare" so obviously the fourth one is "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare." Video games are absurd https://t.co/Ghb1m2srC4— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) May 24, 2019 This does raise a couple of interesting questions. Is it possible that this new Modern Warfare, without a number to accompany it, is a reboot of the series? Or will it pick up from the events of the third game? Time will tell, but an announcement officially from Infinity Ward and Activision is imminent as they have already confirmed the game’s presence at E3 2019. We will surely know more information soon. For now, we can safely say that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is currently in development.

Last year in December I got the chance to review Mutant year Zero: Road to Eden. I scored the game a solid 9 out of 10, and that score still holds true. The freedom to explore and tackle encounters as you see fit was refreshing. The progress of the game felt fluid and the combat was rewarding as heck. Yesterday, however, developer The Bearded Ladies revealed the first official expansion for Mutant Year Zero. The expansion, called Seed of Evil, will release on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch on July 30th. Seed of Evil will continue where the base game ended, meaning you will have to complete the base game to get the full effect of the expansion. The expansion will bring new zones to explore, a new threat to eliminate, and a brand new mutant named Big Khan. The massive mutated moose brings with him new mutants as well, including Ground Pound and Flame Puke. Though no word was given on console pricing, the expansion is already available on Steam for an absolute steal at R105.00. Or, if you also need the base game, the Deluxe Edition is gong for R 205.20 (which includes the base game and expansion).