{"id":35064,"date":"2019-06-11T14:46:51","date_gmt":"2019-06-11T21:46:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/?p=35064"},"modified":"2019-06-11T14:46:51","modified_gmt":"2019-06-11T21:46:51","slug":"june-xbox-gold-not-hat-trick-triumph","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/bens-bytes\/june-xbox-gold-not-hat-trick-triumph\/","title":{"rendered":"June’s Xbox Games With Gold Not a Hat Trick, But Still a Triumph"},"content":{"rendered":"
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You don\u2019t get much more focused on a target audience than with the big title Xbox included with their Games with Gold this month.\u00a0 With the Stanley Cup hockey championship reaching its end very soon — and with both Blues and Bruins fans biting their fingernails in anticipation of the outcome of Game 7 — it\u2019s admittedly pretty smart for the folks at Microsoft to throw in a hockey simulator so that they can vicariously play out the crashes, brawls, and high-tension slapshots that come with the sport. For those who aren\u2019t hockey fans? Eh, this isn\u2019t a superb month, though there\u2019s one standout title that just about everyone should play if they haven\u2019t already, which has recently been graphically upgraded, and another smaller-scale fighter worth engaging. Let\u2019s dive into the games.<\/p>\n

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Click Here to Grab\u00a0a 12-Month\u00a0Xbox Live Gold Subscription\u00a0at Amazon<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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\"nhl

EA<\/p><\/div>\n

Xbox One<\/h3>\n

NHL 2019 (June 1-30)<\/h4>\n

Even for those who don\u2019t really follow the sport, there\u2019s something engaging about the speed and precision of hockey video games that transcends barriers. Even though I grew up in the southern US in an area where there wasn\u2019t much of a hockey culture, great times were still had playing EA\u2019s mid-\u201890s NHL titles \u2026 perhaps more so with NHLPA \u201993<\/em>, since fights could still break out in that one. \u00a0After enduring the growing pains of full 3D conversion in the late-\u201890s and a reversal of NHL\u2019s \u201cno fighting in the game\u201d policy, we\u2019ve arrived at NHL \u201919<\/em>, marking nearly — *gasp*<\/strong><\/em> — three decades of refinement into its current, wholly realistic simulator form. Few monumental changes have played out over the course of the past several iterations, though reports from players have commended the improvements to skating movement and physics responses above the previous year\u2019s iteration, while also critiquing the customization that was heavily pushed by EA prior to the game\u2019s release.<\/p>\n

Rivals of Aether (June 16-July 15)<\/h4>\n

After a quarter-century of fighting games, it\u2019s no easy task to create a new one that feels, in some way, fresh and different from the rest. Rivals of Aether<\/em> manages to do so, even if one can identify the clear influences in this pseudo-sequel to Dan Fornace\u2019s \u201cdemake\u201d of Super Smash Bros<\/em>, Super Smash Land<\/em>. While the arena boundaries and percentage bats recall the iconic Smash Bros\u00a0<\/em>mechanics and the beastly combatants trigger some memories of the classic Killer Instinct<\/em>, the retro graphics and the clever scale of the characters against the battleground makes for a fighter with a distinct attitude. \u00a0\u00a0Rivals of Aether<\/em> delivers on couch and online multiplayer as well, and the roster of 8 elemental fighters can be expanded to 14 with DLC \u2026 including a pair of cameos from other popular indie games. Both critics and players agree that despite its condensed scale and indie roots, this fighter packs a big, full punch.<\/p>\n

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\"portal

valve<\/p><\/div>\n

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Xbox 360<\/h3>\n

Portal: Still Alive (June 1-15)<\/h4>\n

Many who have played the likes of The Turing Test<\/em>, The Witness<\/em>, Pneuma: Breath of Life<\/em>, Quantum Conundrum<\/em>, and many other first-person puzzle games often have a consistent remark when chatting about each one: \u201cWell, it\u2019s kinda like Portal, except \u2026<\/em>\u201d\u00a0 For good reason, too, as Portal<\/em> remains the gold standard for environmental, atmospheric puzzle experiences, coining its own phrase — \u201cthinking in portals\u201d — to describe the mindset one adopts to get through the challenges thrown at \u2018em by GLaDOS, the femme-voice robotic overseer of the obstacle courses designed by Aperture Science. The number of gamers out there who haven\u2019t played Portal<\/em> must be growing increasingly minuscule, as it\u2019s become such an iconic and quintessential playing experience that just about anyone who can pick up a controller will enjoy, but I doubt that\u2019ll stop almost anyone from snagging this digital copy of Still Alive<\/em> for free, if only to preserve the option to download it whenever they\u2019d like and jump back into the Enrichment Center.<\/p>\n

Earth Defense Force 2017 (June 16-30)<\/h4>\n

Rounding out the month\u2019s offerings is a decade-old installment from the niche franchise Earth Defense Force<\/em>, which isn\u2019t too far off from being a modern-day reimaging of the B-movie sci-fi classic, THEM!<\/em> Earth Defense Force 2017<\/em>, also known as EDF 3<\/em> in Japan, marks the arrival of this series into North America, and one shouldn\u2019t be too concerned with narrative when jumping into battle with the giant insect antagonist invading the streets of Tokyo. \u00a0\u00a0Beyond the multitude of weapons and collection of different soldiers one can access throughout the game, the objectives are simple: shoot at the insectoid antagonists from a third-person perspective and save the world. Even by the standard of over a decade ago, however, critics were quick to point out the deficiencies in the graphical presentation and the dialogue, as well as its repetitive nature. For those who are tolerant of lower caliber graphics and just need to blast a few insects, however, Earth Defense Force might just hit the spot, if only for a little while.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You don\u2019t get much more focused on a target audience than with the big title Xbox included with their Games with Gold this month.\u00a0 With the Stanley Cup hockey championship reaching its end very soon — and with both Blues and Bruins fans biting their fingernails in anticipation of the outcome of Game 7 — […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":35065,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[1261,25,372,378],"class_list":["post-35064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bens-bytes","tag-games-with-gold","tag-video-games","tag-xbox-360","tag-xbox-one"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35064","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=35064"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35064\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35077,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35064\/revisions\/35077"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}