PlutoRico

Just like last event, I'm getting the 1st completion of 2023 : Spellbreak Spellbreak is a free to play spellcasting battle royale game. It's shutting down on January 10th so I had to speedrun through it during the few days off that I had. Wasn't a great experience nonetheless, I'm glad it's finally done and I can move on to other things 😅 Launching the festivities for the 2nd straight year in a row ☑️ Making @Copanele work on the 1st of January for the 2nd straight year in a row ☑️ See you next year for the three peat Copa 😋 Happy New Year everyone, wishing you all many UR completions for 2023 😁

I have been away from gaming and from the forums for a good while now but I figured that my favorite event would be the perfect occasion for me to make a comeback 😁 Best believe I'm also in for this year haha, here is my list for tier 1 (subject to changes) : Big thank you @Copanele for organizing the best community event of this forum for the 3rd year in a row now 🤘

My maaaan!! Thank you so much for this post, I really appreciate the hard work and dedication you've put into it to make it as immersive as possible 😆 I need to honor it by answering as much as I possibly can now haha : Absolutely love this intro and the way you were able to link it to the previous post you made about your trip to Chicago 👊 Funny enough, I didn't even know you were from LA until you put "Southern California" on your location, and it's only after seeing that last post you made about Chicago that the idea of requesting something like this came to my mind, so it's totally fitting, perfectly done my friend haha 😁 Did you drive your way to these places btw? Or did you Uber everywhere? Actually I think the opposite haha, I feel like you can't do much without a car in SoCal. I agree that traffic and parking can be quite annoying but having to take Uber rides back and forth every time you go out is even more of a hassle 😅 I remember my first few weeks out there when I didn't have a car yet, I was quite lazy to do anything because of that. I was always like "yeah I'll go there or visit that place once I get myself a car" which made me postpone everything until I finally got one haha 😂 Oh man this brings back so many good memories, especially late at night after coming back from the club or a sport game in a bar 😭 I definitely upvote on the hikes. This is the perfect place to go and there are so many excellent ones. Something that I miss a lot as it's not very common over here plus hiking without SoCal weather doesn't feel quite the same to be honest 😂 The consensus that I get from people overall is that "the burger is good, the fries are meh". But I agree with your take, SoCal people tend to hype it up to outsiders so their expectations may be high and they end up being disappointed. Personally I love it, I always take animal style fries along with a double double and a strawberry shake. In N Out shakes are really great imo and they should be the ones getting all the hype haha This is actually hilarious because I remember my first time visiting DowntownLA I ordered a Uber (I didn't have a car yet at that time) and I didn't know where to put the arrival location, so I just clicked in the middle of the map and I was like "yeah I'll figure it out once I'm there". I remember feeling exactly the same way you described it going from Staples Center to that middle point I selected. I was completely unaware at the time and remember the Uber drive advising me to go back up in the neighborhood around the arena instead 😅 The beach is probably the thing I miss the most. I used to be in Santa Monica/Venice pretty much every day, whether it was for a good workout sesh at muscle beach or just to do some sightseeing and get a tan 😂 Man life is truly much better in a beach city Thank you again for this great immersive post my friend. I really appreciate the time and effort you put through it. You've described a lot of places I never heard of which is a good thing because it means I'll get to discover so much more whenever I'm able to come back 😁 We gotta kick it too like Vice said haha PS : Excellent one, I real life laughed at this 😂😂😂

Completed 3 more games for my Tier 3 : After a tiny notice of 21 days and some change, Killzone Shadow Fall shut down a few days ago on August 12th. I had completed all the multiplayer trophies in due time and just needed to tackle on the single player part. It was my first Killzone and the one that introduced me to the series, I missed out on the trilogy and the subsequent shutdown a few years ago, silly me for not using PSNP sooner to be kept up to date with the announcements. I had to dig in some YouTube videos in order to have some backstory on what went down in the trilogy since the events of Shadow Fall are happening 30 years after the ending of Killzone 3. I really enjoyed the single player story. The level design is very diverse and colorful which wasn't always the case on previous entries judging by the videos I watched. You can tell that Guerrilla made good use of the new hardware driving the series and freshened it up a bit. All in all, the game still looks great in 2022, even for a launch title. At first, the very short notice almost drove me away but I'm glad I went for it and was able to get it done in time. Rigs: Mechanized Combat League is another game that was part of that ridiculous 21 days notice from Guerrilla. It's a VR first person sports shooter where the players take control of large mechs known as the rigs and fight each other in open arenas in a professional sports competition set several years in the future. The matches are 5 minutes long divided into two halves, where 3v3 players are driving their own rigs and fight each other in order to score the most points. There are 3 game types : Team Takedown where the winner is the one with the most takedowns, PowerSlam where you need to score enough takedowns to go into overdrive (which is basically a super mode where all your abilities are active at the same time) and score by going through a ring in the middle of the arena while the overdrive is active, and Endzone, which follows the same rules as American football, you need to grab a holographic ball and score by going through the opponents' goalposts. This was my first VR game and I experienced motion sickness for the first time in my life not even 2h in when I started 😂 It was bad, I felt nauseous, had a headache and was about to throw up. But after a few session I got used to the feeling and was able to manage it. My other problem is that since I have long curly hair, it gets stuck in the headset so it always feels like I'm ripping out my head every time I take it off 😂 But it was a fun experience nonetheless haha As a Cali guy, I couldn't miss out on Driver San Francisco, so when I heard about all the games shutting down on September 1st, Driver was first in line. The main reason why is I wanted to see how faithful the Bay Area was depicted in the game. With the Assassin's Creed games, Ubisoft proved that they can reproduce a whole city very accurately, so I wanted to see how they fared on this one. And even tho it's not as good as Rockstar recreating Los Angeles in GTA V, the depiction of San Francisco and the neighboring Bay Area cities like Oakland was still pretty good. Driver San Francisco is a unique type of racer because it allows you to shift into any car on the road from a bird eye point of view. Let's say you're driving a car chasing some bad guys and you're left behind, you can press X which will bring an up above view of the road, you can than press on in another car and you'll shift into it, taking control of the driver. You can use this gameplay feature to make a lot of missions way easier. Instead of focusing on driving fast and cornering accurately, you can opt to send oncoming traffic into the opponents and take them out or block routes with a truck for example. The online features a lot of modes where you can also make good use of the shifting ability. Driver San Francisco allows you to use real world licensed cars like the Lamborghini Murcielago and they are all well reproduced which was a pleasant surprise too. On the other hand, I felt like the game was at its worst when it tried to be a straightforward racing game. The handling can be over the top sometimes and the cars have a frustrating tendency of drifting at every turn. It's fun when you're messing around in the city, not so much when you're trying to beat a time trial or finish a race. The game was an enjoyable experience without accounting for those frustrating mechanics nonetheless 😁 This concludes my streak of 6 shutdown games in a row from Ghost Recon Future Soldier to Driver San Francisco. I don't have any other shutdown game I have to work on so I can finally have some freedom haha. I'm probably gonna start the online grind of Far Cry 2 next. The game was down for 4 months and it's a miracle it's back up and running so I don't want to miss out on it. I also need to work on the Most Wanted Games of the quarter. See you guys on the next one 😁

Killzone Shadow Fall Introduction On July 22nd, Guerrilla gave a tiny 21 days notice for the shutdown of the last two remaining Killzone along with Rigs, a VR game. The termination of online services will mark the death of the Killzone franchise since the trilogy on the PS3 has already been shutdown a few years ago. Unless we get a remaster, it won't be possible to play Killzone online for the foreseeable future. Killzone Shadow Fall has always been on my hitlist, ever since I got myself a PS4 a few years ago. Even with the ridiculousness of the time given by the devs, the shutdown notice gave me a good reason to bump this game up as my top priority in order to get it done in the 21 allocated days. Story and Gameplay Shadow Fall being my first Killzone, I had to dig some YouTube videos to get a little bit of briefing on what happened in the previous entries so I won't be totally lost when playing this game haha. From what I gathered, Killzone takes place in a fictional world where a nuclear war has rendered Earth uninhabitable. Worlds governments along with private firms formed an international alliance in order to try and establish human colonies in some other planets. The Alpha Centauri system was selected, made by two planets : Vekta, a rich Earth-like world, and Helghan, a wasteland. When some private firm tied to Helghan decided to try and buy ownership of Vekta as well, sanctions were imposed for unfair business practices, which ultimately led to a war. The colonists were driven out of Vekta and exiled. In response, they established their own civilization on Helghan. The harsh environment and atmosphere killed many and forced the survivors to use respirators and air tanks to be able to breathe. But the human body is so great that eventually, the population mutated into pale skinned humanoids with increased strength, stamina as well as intelligence and adapted to the environment. Convinced of their superiority, the Helghan consider the human race to be beneath them and dream of one day reconquering Vekta and expanding their empire to the neighboring star systems. At the end of Killzone 3, a petrusite detonation has rendered the Helghan planet uninhabitable. Helghast survivors were granted refuge on Vekta, allowing them to colonize half of the planet. A wall was built to separate both civilization from each other due to the resentment they still bear over the previous wars. Both Vektans and Helghast routinely perform covert operations against each other hoping to gain a strategic advantage over their counterpart and finish the war each claims the other started. Killzone Shadow Fall takes place 30 years after the events of Killzone 3 and will take you to Vekta, New Helghan which is the other side of the wall, but also the Helghan planet, the original homeworld of the Helghast and what remains of it. The first thing that struck me when going through the campaign was the level design. The environments are stunning and colorful, whether it's a city, a forest or a space station. The landscapes are diverse and gorgeous, which wasn't always the case when looking at previous entries. With 30 years separating it from the lore of the previous Killzone titles and new hardware driving it, Shadow Fall was the perfect time to freshen up the series, and it was done well by Guerrilla. That variety makes you enjoy the story even more. The plot is full of cold war nuances, the result of living in the same planet I guess. Much like the Helghast rely heavily on a Nazi-like imagery, the setting evokes a post war Germany influence with two sides split by a wall in between them. As you control a Shadow Marshal, which is basically a high ranked covert assassin and special operatives in the Vektan military, you're provided with an OWL, a robotic drone that can be dispatched to assist you in attacking or stunning enemies, deploy an energy shield or can be used as a zipline to access further areas. You can also use it to hack alarms and computers, preventing enemies from calling reinforcements or opening doors to allow you to progress through the story. The OWL can also heal you using adrenaline packs whenever you get killed in combat as long as you have one in your inventory. This final trump card incorporated in the Killzone repertoire by the devs is a truly useful one. It wasn't present in any of the previous Killzone entries and it comes in handy when you're looking to clear out rooms full of hostiles, especially in the highest difficulty settings. On the other hand, there were some times where I felt like Shadow Fall was insisting on doing things it's not very good at to begin with. There is some 0 gravity and free falling platform sections that all share a thing in common : they are bad simply because they don't control well and they are very frustrating especially when you're playing on Elite Mode in which death means restarting the whole chapter from scratch. Enjoyment and challenge Killzone Shadow Fall was overall pretty enjoyable. Not having played the previous Killzone games took a bit away from it but it was an enjoyable experience nonetheless. The game aged pretty well graphically for a launch title. Even when you look past the gorgeous visuals, Killzone Shadow Fall is a competent shooter in terms of both campaign gameplay and multiplayer offerings. The campaign was interesting to go through. The multiplayer grind was alright I would say, not as bad as people made it to be. I thought 21 days was ridiculously short but the online took me less time that I had anticipated. The coop DLC was pretty fun, I didn't even need to boost it, I mainly played with randoms on my way to the 50 wins trophy. I had a lot of fun with it while playing with randoms without voice chat or any coordination so I would assume it would have been a much better experience with a group haha. After Ghost Recon Future Soldier, Killzone Shadow Fall is another enjoyable game that unexpectedly made it into my milestone list. I was at 19 plats and was looking for a good candidate for #20. Albeit the multiplayer is dead, Killzone Shadow Fall is now immortalized in my profile 😂 : Enjoyment : 7/10 Challenge : 6/10 Killzone Shadow Fall is gone but immortalized

Completed 3 more games from my Tier 3 since my last update : Ghost Recon Future Soldier, a 3rd person shooter, is scheduled to shut down on September 1st alongside other Ubisoft PS3 titles and since I've had this game on my hitlist for a while, I had to bump it up as my top priority. The first thing I would like to talk about is the crappy servers that this game has. It's easily the worst servers for a game I have ever witnessed. Me and my boosting partners could look up for the same game type at the same time and end up on two different lobbies. Go figure I remember being unable to connect to anyone for 3 days in a row when I first tried. At that time I was really hesitating about fully committing myself to it because I was worried I would end up with unobtainables. Basically I had to contact my internet provider to ask them to open ports on my router. I also put my PS3 on DMZ "demilitarized zone". All of this worked wonders, I was able to connect with everyone. In fact, it worked so great that I was victim of my success, everybody was messaging me because they needed me to host in order for everyone to be able to join the lobby, which wasn't possible with other hosts 😂 Once those connection problems were behind me, the game proved to be very enjoyable. I made a lot of friends when going for the multiplayer grind which made the whole process less painful. I also enjoyed the campaign a lot. You play as a member of a military squad, you can do the campaign with up to 4 people. If you decide to do it solo, your 3 other teammates will be AI. And don't think you're losing the exchange because the AI is pretty good. In fact most challenges were easier to do with the AI than with boosting partners. All in all it was a great experience and I'm really glad I didn't throw in the towel when I first had those server issues 😁 You can check on my checklist for a full review of the game. EVE: Valkyrie - Warzone is a 1st person spaceship shooter slated to shutdown on August 5th. The game got delisted without notice so I had to buy 2 different physical copies (NA and EU) and get it done quickly before the deadline. It was mainly a boost with my alt doing some boring grind like getting 50 wins in different game modes, getting a kill with all ships and a grind to level 50 that has to be done in public matches. The level trophies autopop from one stack to another but the rest of the grind has to be done all over again. I'm glad I got it done in time but it was a pretty forgettable experience. In other news I finished the online components of Driver San Francisco, Killzone Shadow Fall and Rigs which means I'm up to date with all the upcoming shutdowns in the next few weeks. All I have to do now is tackle the single player for all these games 😁 That's all folks! See you on the next update

Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Future Soldier Introduction A few weeks ago, Ubisoft gave a termination notice, shutting down a dozen of old PS3 titles. There were 2 games I was interested in getting done before the deadline : Driver San Francisco and Ghost Recon Future Soldier. When I wanted to start this game, I had a lot of trouble at getting connected with other people. For example me and my boosting partner could both search for a deathmatch game at the same time and end up in two different lobbies. Someone could try and host a game but not everyone would be able to join him. There is plenty of examples like these that just showcase how bad the servers for this game were. It is without a doubt the worst servers I had to deal with in my gaming career. I had to go to extreme lengths to be able to make it work: I contacted my internet provider and asked them to open ports on my rooter. I also put my PS3 on DMZ "demilitarized zone" which is basically another layer to me trying to get as much of an open type of connection as possible. It worked great, I was able to connect to everyone. In fact it worked so great that I was designated the host for every gaming session 😂 I was able to finish all the online trophies except one a few days before the PSN went down unexpectedly which resulted in all the Ubisoft games slated to shut down having inaccessible servers. As of today, they were brought back, they are all up and running except one : Ghost Recon Future Soldier like you may have guessed. The only trophy I was missing was the coop campaign trophy, I had completed 7 of 12 missions so I was really annoyed to miss the cut that close to the goal 😅 Luckily, a friend (@Riiszk) tested and confirmed that you can get the coop campaign trophy offline on LAN with 2 PS3s so I went for it right away. The only problem is that I had started the campaign with my boosting partners directly on Elite and I was unable to change it on LAN mode, so I had to go through the last 5 remaining chapters on the highest difficulty setting while basically carrying my alt. And let me tell you that I struggled at times haha. On Elite you're unable to revive your coop teammates, so if one of us die, we go back to the last checkpoint. I basically spent the last 5 chapters trying to hide my alt somewhere outside the heat of the battle while I was taking care of the enemies before bringing him in with me to advance through the story 😂 Story and Gameplay In 2024, a group of U.S soldiers is deployed in Nicaragua to disrupt a weapons trafficking operation. As they inspect a convoy they ambushed, they get killed by a bomb remotely detonated. Following this, Ghost team Hunter is deployed to investigate the source of the bomb. What begins as a hunt to find the perpetrator quickly turns into a globe trotting chase to unveil a much bigger conspiracy. The campaign is meant to be played in coop with up to 4 people, each controlling a member of the Ghost squad. If you're playing it by yourself, the other 3 members will be AI teammates going through the missions alongside you. And in my opinion, this was the biggest strength of the game. During stealth phases, you can mark up to 4 targets for a synchronized kill, a "sync shot". The game shows you an icon letting you know when your teammates are ready to fire. This is where the AI shows how good it is because once you mark up your enemies, your teammates will automatically move to a location to get the best possible shot at the target while being smart enough to stay in cover and keeping a low profile. When all targets are blue, you fire and your squad mates will follow along simultaneously. This is a really good gameplay aspect that truly differentiates Future Soldier. In most of the stealth based franchises, you have to kill every enemy one by one without being spotted. In this game, you're able to take down 2, 3 or even 4 hostiles at the same time, which gives you more room for planning and strategy in order to prevent a patrolling guard from stumbling over a dead body and raising the alarm. In some cases it's mandatory since the enemies are too close to each other. It all comes down to planning and order of fire. Cleaning an entire area of enemies in a sync silent assault without being noticed feels very satisfying. The other strong gameplay aspect is the inclusion of a drone that can be launched and controlled remotely, hovering over the field and showing hostiles' locations through a bird's eye perspective. You can leave the drone in the air indefinitely as long as it doesn't get spotted by the enemies which allows you to switch between normal view and drone camera view. The drone, coupled with the sync shots is a lethal combination that gives you a lot of room to clean up one (pun totally intended 😂). You can mark targets directly from the drone's perspective and order your teammates to aim at specific enemies. On the other hand, the drone can be spotted and shot by hostiles. If it take too much damage, you have to call it back for repair, which is done automatically after a short period. This also means that you never lose it, you just need to wait until it's fully operational again. The drone can also be landed on the ground and maneuver on its wheels. It has its own camouflage alongside a sonic blast that disorients enemies. What can't it do honestly? 😁 The game is very well paced, balancing stealth and action perfectly and sprinkling it all with dramatic set pieces used to punctuates the tempo and managing to create a lot of tension. You can choose to tackle some mission however you want, either keeping a low profile or going in guns blazing at everything in sight. There is also a nice variety in level design. You're changing location in each mission and it shows. The Ghosts are dispatched throughout the globe to restore peace, using military grade gadgets like adaptive camouflage for example that allows you to become partially invisible. It is explained that the processing power doesn't exist yet for the camouflage to keep up with quick movements so it's only active when your character moves slowly. I felt like the game had struck a careful balance between fantasy and realism. The gear at your disposal is good enough to give you an advantage without making you invincible. Enjoyment and challenge I had a lot of fun going for this game. The campaign was really enjoyable both solo and with partners. I really enjoyed the different missions settings, going from one country to another and having to adapt to the environment. The plot was also pretty decent. I had the chance to meet a lot of good boosting partners when going for this game, I made a lot of friends along the way and we're planning on getting other games done together in the future. All in all it was such a great experience that I decided to make it my 1,000th trophy milestone : I didn't have much of a choice to be honest, it was always going to be one of the upcoming shutdown game I have been working on (Ghost Recon, EVE, Driver San Francisco) and Ghost Recon proved to be the most enjoyable one out of all. Enjoyment : 8/10 Challenge : 5/10 Alone or with a group of dedicated soldiers, Ghost Recon Future Soldier is a war that you will want to keep fighting

I'm voting for Injustice Gods Among Us (EU). I see that you are over 50% for the NA version so I'm hoping to see you do the same for this one too 😁 PSN Card : USA (Happy 4th of July)