{"id":33568,"date":"2018-11-08T17:27:54","date_gmt":"2018-11-09T01:27:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/?p=33568"},"modified":"2018-11-09T10:08:41","modified_gmt":"2018-11-09T18:08:41","slug":"bulletstorms-yakuzas-do-the-heavy-lifting-in-novembers-ps-freebies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/bens-bytes\/bulletstorms-yakuzas-do-the-heavy-lifting-in-novembers-ps-freebies\/","title":{"rendered":"Bulletstorms, Yakuzas Do the Heavy Lifting in November’s PS+ Freebies"},"content":{"rendered":"
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We\u2019re in the final stretch of Sony\u2019s multi-console free offerings to PS+ subscribers; at the beginning of March, they\u2019ll only be making PS4 freebies available to download. As the remaining months go by, the tilt in this direction becomes clearer, as they choose bigger, bolder titles as the downloads for their current-gen console and \u2026 well, put simply, toss out some incredibly lackluster remnants of the games they haven\u2019t previously offered for their legacy and portable machines. \u00a0As the PS4 gets a flashy remaster of a popular last-gen game and a ground-up remake of a PS2-era powerhouse, the other consoles get party games, borderline-shovelware larks, unremarkable point-and-click adventures and a very odd limousine driving game. Shall we take a closer look?<\/p>\n

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Click Here to Grab\u00a0a 1-Year PlayStation Plus Subscription\u00a0at Amazon<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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\"bulletstorm

People Can Fly<\/p><\/div>\n

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PS4<\/h3>\n

Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition<\/h4>\n

Much like the political spectrum in America nowadays, the first-person genre seems to be splitting into polar-opposite sides from one another: either the games are as grim and hyper realistic as they can get, or the developers try to make them as gleefully outlandish as possible.\u00a0 When it arrived in 2011, Bulletstorm<\/em> was insistently marketed as the latter, wearing its outlandish violence and unruly shooting on its sleeve.\u00a0 For those sold on that idea, the game delivered anarchistic action that tapped into its expletive-ridden attitude in just the right ways; for those who needed convincing, the game\u2019s refined gunplay mechanics and a charmingly wayward sci-fi setting lured those detractors into relishing its chaos as well. Developer People Can Fly have unleased the Full Clip Edition through Gearbox Publishing as a full remastering of the original experience, while also including new content created by the dev team that includes a campaign mode sporting quick access to the game\u2019s myriad guns and new competitive Echo maps.<\/p>\n

Yakuza Kiwami<\/h4>\n

Kiwami means \u201cultimate\u201d or \u201cextreme\u201d in Japanese depending on the context, so one can view the title of SEGA\u2019s game to mean that it\u2019s the ultimate version of Yakuza, a sleeper hit from the PS2 era and a franchise maker. In an environment dominated by the likes of Grand Theft Auto<\/em>, Yakuza<\/em> offered a similar urban-sandbox experience with incredibly distinct differences, notably in the combat and role-playing arenas. \u00a0Players take control of a yakuza, Kazuma Kiryu, as he traverses the fictionalized, elevated-reality district of Tokyo after a decade-long stint in prison, pursuing his disappeared childhood friend Yumi and navigating the gang warfare that\u2019s breaking out in the area. \u00a0A foursome of fighting styles styles can be chosen mid-combat, while victories in battles earn Kazuma both coin and experience points that can poured into advancing his capabilities.\u00a0 Yakuza: Kiwami<\/em> adds new secondary narrative threads and game modes, but it sticks to many of the simulation aspects that propelled the original to an iconic status.<\/p>\n

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\"jackbox

Jackbox Games<\/p><\/div>\n

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PS3<\/h3>\n

The Jackbox Party Pack 2<\/h4>\n

Console party games that aren\u2019t<\/em> under the Nintendo umbrella are a niche within a niche.\u00a0 Typically, folks will boot up the likes of Mario Party<\/em> or the Karts\/Smash Bros.<\/em> if they\u2019re in the mood for that kind of atmosphere; or, they\u2019ll pull out any number of popular tabletop party games, which continue to grow in popularity. If there\u2019s a recognizable, reliable name among the rest, it\u2019d be the \u201cYou Don\u2019t Know Jack\u201d franchise, which has released a series of Jackbox Party Pack games over the years; the fifth installment was released this year.\u00a0 When asked, most gaming groups will point to the first one \u2013 which contains You Don\u2019t Know Jack<\/em> \u2013 or the third one as the essential packs to get, while this one, Party Pack 2, rarely if ever gets mentioned at the top.\u00a0 Take that how you will.<\/p>\n

Arkedo Series<\/h4>\n

Close to a decade ago, Arkedo Studio endeavored to create a game a month for an indefinite amount of time.\u00a0 While a fourth game was announced, the pursuit ultimately ended in three titles, which comprise the Arkedo Series,<\/em> a run of retro-heavy games that share elements with late-\u201880s franchises. The vintage aspects seems to be the only real drawing factor to these games, though.<\/p>\n

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\"burly

Brain&Brain<\/p><\/div>\n

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PS Vita<\/h3>\n

Burly Men at Sea<\/h4>\n

This point-and-click experience from Brain&Brain received a bit of a push for appearing on TIME Magazine\u2019s Top Games of 2016, a distinction that seems mostly focused on how the aesthetics brought the folklore narratives to life.\u00a0 Charming visuals and sound effects don\u2019t seem to be strong enough to plow through the game\u2019s sporadic control problems, though, which differs across the many systems that it\u2019s been released on. More importantly, the lack of interactivity makes one question its distinction as a \u201cgame\u201d, and iffy controls ewven in that regard make one double-guess whether to embark on this narrative-based adventure.<\/p>\n

Roundabout<\/h4>\n

Finally, we\u2019ve got Roundabout<\/em>, which reminds me of those hybrid games from the \u201890s that combined standard game controls with live-action cutscenes. It\u2019s kinda like Crazy Taxi meets Burnout Paradise\u2019s crash mode, only you\u2019re in a stretch limousine that can\u2019t stop spinning in circles and the destruction gets viewed from an isometric point of view. An absurd premise mixes with amateurish cutscenes in a peculiar videogame excursion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We\u2019re in the final stretch of Sony\u2019s multi-console free offerings to PS+ subscribers; at the beginning of March, they\u2019ll only be making PS4 freebies available to download. As the remaining months go by, the tilt in this direction becomes clearer, as they choose bigger, bolder titles as the downloads for their current-gen console and \u2026 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":33569,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[1262,1303,1302,401,25],"class_list":["post-33568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bens-bytes","tag-ps-plus","tag-ps-vita","tag-ps3","tag-ps4","tag-video-games"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33568","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/57"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33568"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33568\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33580,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33568\/revisions\/33580"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}