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AI companions tend to come in a couple different flavors. There’s the true companions, versatile and interesting characters who really add something to the experience, like Elizabeth from BioShock Infinite or Alyx from Half-Life 2. Next are the harmless annoyances, who aren’t great to have around but don’t get in the way–Ashley Graham has the good sense to keep her head down, and Navi has some alright advice here and there. And then there are the AI companions who actively make the game worse by existing. From charging headfirst into enemy bullets to using up your precious resources while you shriek in rage, they seem deadset on making EVERY level the “hell level.”
In (dis)honor of these hated, virtual hanger-ons, I’ve compiled a list of the worst AI companions gaming has to offer. Hoarders, pesterers, jerkfaces and straight-up dead weight–they’re all here, and they’re going to do their best to ruin your fun. It’s time for some naming and shaming!
Sheva (Resident Evil 5)
The thing about going into battle with someone is that you need to trust them. “With your life” is a pretty good benchmark, since your partner will hopefully be stopping bullets and knives from trying to occupy the same space as your internal organs. That’s why so many players hate Sheva, Chris Redfield’s partner in Resident Evil 5: she can’t be trusted. She consumes all your shared ammo and health items like its penny candy, and when you’re on your last legs and need her most, she has a penchant for standing around and letting nature run its course. She may not be a bad character per say, but it’s kind of hard to remember that when she’s watching you die like an unfeeling robot.
Tails (Sonic 2)
Bless Tails; he really does try. He just sucks so bad that failure is his only option, and he simply can’t keep up with Sonic “Gotta Go Fast” the Hedgehog. Sometimes that’s literal, like when he’s so slow on special stages that he regularly runs into bombs and ruins everything. Other times he’s just flat-out dense, like when he collapses platforms before Sonic can even touch them or runs straight into very obvious spikes. You want to give him a little credit, because he will nab a ring or two for you. But then he’ll promptly lose them doing something stupid, or drag you down when you try to help him, and you’ll suddenly wish Sonic would aim his fist bumps a little higher.
Duck Hunt Dog (Duck Hunt)
With man’s-best-friends like these, who needs enemies? Not Duck Hunt, where your only real enemy in the struggle for duck dominance is your son-of-a-bitch hunting dog. Rather than focusing on your victories like any good dog should, the Duck Hunt Dog spends more time ridiculing you for your failures. The mockery never ends. Every time one of the slippery fowl gets away from you, the Dog is there to undercut your self-esteem until you just can’t take it ANYMORE!!! You can’t shoot him either, to the disappointment of frustrated players everywhere. However, he is set to appear in the upcoming Super Smash Bros for Wii U/3DS, so revenge might finally be ours.
Roman (Grand Theft Auto 4)
Niko Bellic deals with some unpleasant things in GTA IV, brawling with vicious gang members and dealing with the popo after accidentally mowing down a group of tourists. But few things in Liberty City make your stomach drop like getting a phone call and hearing “HEEEEEY COOOOOOOOOUSIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN” blasting down the line. After the fifteenth time cousin Roman ask you to join him in an annoying bowling minigame, you start running people over out of rage instead of just for fun. It would almost be bearable, if that was the worst family failure you had to deal with. But when you have to kick the crap out of a bunch of guys to clean up your cousin’s mess? And then he calls you for the sixteenth time? Bowling balls aren’t all that’s gonna roll!
Survivors (Dead Rising)
I get that the zombie apocalypse can be stressful, especially when you find yourself locked in a shopping mall with a horde of the undead, packs of psychopaths, and no Orange Julius stands in sight. But as completely idiotic, frustrating, and useless as the survivors in Dead Rising can be, it looks like the zombies arent the only ones in want of brains. Most of your human cohorts are unbelievably slow, lagging behind you even when you’re carrying an injured party on you back. They’re virtually incapable of defending themselves even with a weapon, and have a nasty habit of walking into the thick of a zombie pack and expecting you to get them out. Sure, you can leave particularly infuriating survivors behind, but that hurts your overall score, and the one you left for dead could be replaced by someone equally useless!
Survivors, again (Left 4 Dead)
Speaking of left for dead–sorry, Left 4 Dead–those survivors don’t come out looking so good either when a fellow player isn’t controlling them. CPU versions of the zombie-blasting friends do their best to emulate human behavior, like a robot trying to calculate the square root of love, and do seem to get it right some of the time. But they’ll just as soon stare at you Sheva-like as you die, play lemming and leap off balconies, or get comfy in a toasty patch of fire. Forget any time you need to lay low and not draw attention–the AI knows that proper way to combat the horde is to run in with guns blazing. Oh, and never forget to walk directly up to a witch. Come on, they just need some love.
Superfly Johnson and Mikiko (Daikatana)
Granted, Daikatana itself is notoriously awful, and it’s AI characters could hardly escape the crapshoot. Still, Superfly Johnson (yes, that’s his actual name) and Mikiko go above and beyond, combining their powers to make this game as bad as it could possibly be. These two hit all the terrible AI touchstones: running directly into any stream of bullets you let loose, getting stuck on doors, and happily putting themselves in lethal situations where their deaths spell Game Over for you. They even spice it up a bit by being blithely hostile, occasionally shooting you in the midst of a firefight instead of getting shot themselves. Did I mention friendly fire is on? When Mikiko double-crosses you and steals the Sword-of-Ultimate-Power-or-Whatever at the end (I’d warn for spoilers, but who cares?), you almost start to wonder if these two were actually brilliant enemy combatants. But, no–they’re just that stupid.
Your comrades (Gears of War)
The characters in Gears of War are men and women of extremes. I don’t mean those times when they go mano-a-monster with the demonesque Locusts, but the part where they’re either really bad or way too good at it. In the first Gears game, your brothers in (h)arms spent a lot of time doing lethally stupid things, like meleeing a megaboss or standing on top of a campfire. Dom in particular is known for putting himself in deadly situations that are too dumb to comprehend. The developers saw the problem here and adjusted for Gears of War 3, by which I mean the game basically plays itself. Yes, replace my clunker van with a rocket I can’t ride. That’s so much better.
Natalya (GoldenEye 007)
Yes, Natalya, I know we have to go to the main control room. Now if you could do that without walking in front of all of my bullets, marching directly into enemy fire, or getting stuck on the goddamn door of the goddamn main control room, I would REALLY. FREAKING. APPRECIATE IT!!! The most frustrating part of an otherwise great game, Natalya is the epitome of rage-inducing escort bots. Progressing requires that you anticipate her slow, clunky movements and keep her from walking into the business end of a rifle like she thinks it’s shooting money and free ice cream. I’m pretty sure she leads a double life as a target dummy, which explains why she has such crap dexterity that she gets stuck on a doorframe.
WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT???
Even years after they first drove us into a frothing rage we haven’t forgotten these AI idiots, and I’m sure most of us would rather hang out with anyone else over them. A rabid wolverine, perhaps. What do you think? Does the memory of these horrible partners make you want to tear your hair out? Did we miss an odious offender? Tell us in the comments below, and share in our hate-pain. Hain. Yes.
Want more rage against hapless “helpers”? Check out the Top 7 video game sidekicks we hated. Would you rather sooth your wrathful heart? Check out 10 sidekicks that deserve their own game, because they’re not all useless.
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]]>It just makes zero sense to charge more for a game rental than full ownership, yet this issue litters PS Now in its current form. Dead Island: Riptide? $24.99 for a 90-day rental on PS Now, but only $21.20 to buy your own disc on Amazon (opens in new tab). Darksiders 2? Same price for a rental, compared to $18.86 (opens in new tab) for a physical copy. Even Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition is edged out when it comes to cost. A 90-day rental for $22.90 is a weird price in and of itself, and that’s also undercut at $20.98 by Amazon (opens in new tab) for the whole shebang. This forces the consumer to choose between hunting down a physical copy for cheaper, or paying more for instant, time-limited access.
Those are the most egregious price disparities, but there are some decent values here. Alone in the Dark: Inferno will cost you just $4.99 for a 90-day rental, while buying it Amazon (opens in new tab) will run you around $40. As long as you can finish a game within 90 days, a rental like this is a great value. And this doesn’t just apply to full-price retail releases; downloadable games like Bloodrayne: Betrayal and Bionic Commando Rearmed 2 are just $3.99 for a week-long rental (plenty of time to finish either) versus $9.99 for full purchases.
Thing is, several titles are priced so unwisely that just springing an extra few bucks will get you the full game. Killzone 3 is $14.99 for a 90-day rental, and just $18.99 on Amazon. (opens in new tab) Twisted Metal has the same rental price, and only $15.80 online (opens in new tab). This slight price difference is enough to sway many away from a rental.
This pricing disparity must be overcome because, simply put, there are better ways for PS Now to function. Is the answer a subscription model? That could work–a flat, monthly fee for unlimited rentals, like Gamefly’s model, can sate even the hungriest Sony fanboy. And a flat subscription fee would make the value of individual rentals irrelevant. An all-encompassing price versus standalone rentals is just a smarter way for gamers to spend their hard-earned money. It’s a value proposition that appeals to both thrifty gamers and hardcore fans.
But whose responsibility is it to keep these prices fair and balanced? Who has to decide among individual rentals, subscriptions, or deepening the catalogue? Sony. PS Now isn’t something you look at and think, “Look at all those Way Forward games” or, “Wow, Square Enix titles!” This is a Sony PlayStation venture. Sony is a used car salesman here, and only the worst salesman in the world would charge more for a rental car than a brand new car of the same model.
In its current (and yes, still beta) form, PlayStation Now just doesn’t seem like all that great of a deal. It’s Sony’s responsibility to remedy this by simply offering reasonable, competitive prices across the board. Otherwise, PlayStation Now might never get off the ground–and that would be awful news in an age when digital downloads are so much more convenient than physical media.
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]]>The post Resident Evil 6 – 21 must-know facts about the RE universe appeared first on Game News.
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For sixteen years, Capcom has been unleashing hordes of zombies upon us in the form of Resident Evil. With close to two-dozen games in the franchise, it’s easy to get lost in the lore. It’s even more complicated for newcomers to the series who haven’t been following all the twists, turns, back-stabbings, deaths, revivals, and variations on viruses that have permeated Resident Evils narrative.
With Resident Evil 6 (opens in new tab) about to drop like a bomb on Raccoon City, we decided to put together this Cliff Notes version of Resident Evil to make sure you’re ready for the next installment. It goes without saying, but if you’ve somehow managed not to play a Resident Evil game in the last decade-and-a-half, beware of spoilers.
The Umbrella Corp is the root of all evil (also the root of all zombies)
Everything in Resident Evil (opens in new tab) starts with the Umbrella Corporation. A major pharmaceutical and medical research company, Umbrella was constantly working on consumer grade products like food and cosmetics. Meanwhile, they were also elbow-deep in the manufacturing of biological weapons.
Those very same weapons would ultimately be the downfall of the company. (Note to all future pharmaceutical CEOs, don’t fire the guy who has access to the virus that will turn your secret underground research facility into ground zero for a zombie outbreak.) After a few other instances of bad luck with a batch of biological terrorism, Umbrella crumbled, but the company’s legacy would impact the world for the foreseeable future.
Raccoon City is where it all started
Remember that secret underground research facility we mentioned? Well it happened to be located beneath a mansion on the outskirts of Raccoon City. Though the initial outbreak was limited to the facility in the Arklay Mountains, some of the virus happened to find its way into the sewer system, which in turn led to a vast majority of Raccoon City turning into mindless monsters with a very particular palette.
Raccoon City’s outbreak was contained a few days after it had begun, but it took a lot of hard work, diligence, square cranks, green herbs, and a few nuclear warheads. Though Umbrella was able to cover up this first small incident, many more would soon follow. Mostly because the company was interested in wiping out the population, but also so Capcom could make another sequel.
The outbreaks have always been contained
For the most part, the zombie outbreaks in Resident Evil have been fairly self-contained. Though each new game in the Resident Evil franchise saw its characters exploring new corners of the world, the catastrophe had yet to reach a global scale like it has in Resident Evil 6. Previous games saw the occurrences happen in a single city, a mansion, a cargo ship, or a secluded island.
Of course, not counting the Outbreak spin-offs (which no one does), Resident Evil 6 is the first game in the franchise with so many lead protagonists. It makes sense then the conflict at the heart of the game would have to be bigger than anything that came before. Ultimately, you’re still battling hordes of zombies, still searching for ammunition, and still trying to find the door the rooster key opens.
Chris Redfield has been battling Umbrella from the start
Chris Redfield is the only returning protagonist from the first Resident Evil. He was there at the mansion when Umbrella first unleashed hell, and he’s still chasing the undead to this very day. Of course, he’s started using HGH as a performance enhancer to keep up with all the advances in modern day zombie outbreaks, but hes still the same old Chris Redfield at heart.
Chris has lost a partner or two over the years, but somehow he’s still managed to push on in his quest to rid the world of bio organic weapons. Umbrella may no longer be a thorn in his side, but the amount of damage they caused while in business has created plenty of problems for Chris and the BSAA to solve. It’d be nice for the poor guy to get a break, but as the star or co-star of four games in the franchise, it doesn’t look like Chris will be ending his crusade any time soon.
Chris and Albert Wesker used to be partners
Chris was once a member of an elite special forces detachment in the Raccoon City Police Department called the Special Tactics and Rescue Service. Also on S.T.A.R.S. was a man by the name of Albert Wesker. Both he and Chris were both on the scene at the mansion outbreak, though their motives may have been a bit different.
Despite his penchant for sunglasses, menacing voice, and general creepy disposition, Chris didn’t think anything was wrong with Wesker.
Until Wesker was revealed to be a superhuman evil mastermind
Wesker set the S.T.A.R.S. team up to die in the mansion that night, yet Chris foiled his plans. Rather than being caught, Wesker injected himself with a prototype virus that only made it appear as if he had died. Instead, he was resurrected with newfound strength, speed, and the ability to regenerate, which is always what happens to people who inject themselves with mysterious liquids.
Albert tried to continue the work of Umbrella for the next few years. He also continued to star as one of the main antagonists of the franchise. In Resident Evil 5 (opens in new tab) though, Chris finally managed to track Wesker down in Kijuju, and put an end to all the misery he’d caused countless millions of people.
And then Chris had to kill him
Holding a grudge as long as Chris had was bound to end badly for Albert once Chris finally caught up to him. Even though Wesker had all the heightened senses and abilities one would expect from a science experiment, and he injected himself with another deadly strain known as the Uroboros virus, that still wasnt enough to stop Chris from kicking him into a volcano.
We know what youre thinking. If Wesker is dead, why did we need to know all of that information about him? Well it just so happens Wesker had a kid named Jake, who believe it or not, is one of the protagonists in Resident Evil 6. Will Jake go all Inigo Montoya on Chris? Will Chris proudly show off the boot with which he kicked Jake’s fathers posterior? We cant wait to find out.
Before working for the US government, Leon Kennedy was an ordinary cop in Raccoon City
During the outbreak in Raccoon City, the new cop in town Leon Kennedy was basically left to fight off Umbrella all on his own. Maybe he had a little bit of help from Chris sister Claire Redfield, but Leon definitely did most of the heavy lifting. During his time in the city, Leon befriended a young girl name Sherry Birkin, whose father Leon had to kill after he infected himself with the G-virus. Were sensing a theme here.
Leon managed to destroy Umbrellas underground facility and escape the city by train before it was blown to smithereens by the U.S. government. Funnily enough, that same government then hired Leon for his expertise, and turned him from an everyman rookie cop into one of the most able special agents in history.
Leon saved the last US President’s daughter from Los Zombies
As a special agent, one of Leon’s missions was recovering the then-President’s daughter, Ashley, from the hands of a Spanish cult known as Los Illuminados. There’s no such thing as routine in the world of Resident Evil, so what should have been an easy recovery mission soon turned into another one-man battle against a zombie outbreak.
This time though, the outbreak was even more dangerous because the infected werent undead. They were merely hosts to a parasite known as the Plaga, which allowed the people to be controlled by a master, and gain strength, speed, and an ability to resist pain. Leon was able to overcome the odds stacked against him once more, and saved Ashley (despite her best efforts to get herself killed), forever ensuring his place at the President’s side.
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