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REVIEW: OVERWATCH (PS4, Xbox One, PC - PS4 Version Tested)

27/5/2016

9 Comments

 
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A few years back, early one morning, I got into the car, and pulled away from the house, en route to a meeting. Immediately, I knew something was wrong. Horrible grinding sounds and a car leaning atypically to the left are usually an indication of a badness.

​I parked opposite the house. Leading to the car, from where I'd pulled away, was a worrying, inch-deep gouge in the road. This was a consequence, I discovered, of having had my front offside wheel stolen in the night. They'd been professional about it; at least the car had been propped up on a brick, like they do in cartoons.

My immediate concern was that I might've damaged the axel somehow; the back plate had ploughed a furrow in the tarmac, taking the full weight of the car. Fortunately, there was a mechanic's garage at the top of the road, and so I dashed the 200 yards or so up there to see if somebody would be kind enough to give my Jocelyn a quick once-over. Jocelyn was the name of my car.

The garage shutters were down, but there was a light on in the office next door. I knocked, and it was answered by a shifty-looking young man who was smoking a cigarette. 
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"Yeah?" asked Shifty, regarding me with the sort of expression one typically reserves for catching a stranger in the act of licking their locker door at the local leisure centre.

"I've had my wheel stolen," said I. "Would you be able to have a look at my car?"

"You want me to have a look at your car?" he sputtered, as if it were the most unreasonable request in the world to ask of a mechanic.

"Yeah, if that's ok. I'm worried I might've damaged the axel."

"...Alright," he shrugged.

So back we went down the road, all 200 yards or so, and he crouched down and had a look under the car. He poked around at the axel a bit, and umm-ed and ahh-ed.

"It looks alright," he said, after a while. "I mean, I don't really know."

"Would you need to get it up on a ramp?" I asked.

"I suppose," Shifty replied. "I can't see any damage though. But, y'know, I don't really know."

Then his brow suddenly furrowed, He'd suddenly thought of something. Something important: "Wait... did you want a mechanic?"

"Yeees," I replied, tentatively. "That's why I knocked on your door."

"Nah, mate," he said, utterly confused. "We're not a garage. The garage is next door. We're a chocolate wholesalers."

SORRY... WHAT?
Now, you might be asking what any of that has to do with Overwatch. And it's simple really: it has absolutely nothing to do with Overwatch. Literally nothing.

But it is quite a funny story, and at the time it happened I thought that one day I might write it down. And now I have.

Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if you're appalled that I've wasted a) Your time, and b) Most of this review on an entirely unrelated anecdote about my Jocelyn. But by the same token, at least I haven't wasted my time by writing a review of Overwatch in which I use more or less the exact same language I used on my Battleborn review, earlier this week.

So go back and read that, then take out anything I said about the campaign, and then read the bit below, and we'll be on the same page.
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RIP-OFF
​Overwatch is a Team Fortress 2 rip-off, only with 21 characters - each with their own backstory and abilities (albeit fitting into one of four categories: offensive, defensive, tanks, heal-y dudes), and the bonus of being quite good.

​It even lifts the art style. There's no single-player mode as such, no campaign.

You and your six-person, mixed ability, team have no choice but to play online, against other six-person squads. Team-based play is to the fore, with you having a better chance of victory if you ensure there's at least one of each character type on your team.

It's good. It's fast. It's polished. There is a giant German, armed with a big hammer. And a ninja, and an archer. And someone with a jetpack. And a gorilla.

It's better and more focused - in every area - than Battleborn. It doesn't really do anything revolutionary, but is very good indeed at what it does, and might be the sort of thing you'd like if it sounds like the sort of thing you usually like. And that is the review. GOODBYE! Sssss.

SUMMARY: Another game like some other games, but better than most of them.
SCORE: 500 chocolate wholesalers out of 557 chocolate wholesalers.

FROM THE ARCHIVE:
REVIEW: BATTLEBORN (PS4, XBOX ONE, PC - PS4 VERSION TESTED)
REVIEW-IN-PROGRESS: OVERWATCH (PS4, XBOX ONE, PC)
I TOLD THESE SLOTHS MY THOUGHTS SO FAR ABOUT OVERWATCH, AND THEY JUST LOOKED AT ME LIKE THEY WERE SIMPLE OR SOMETHING


9 Comments
RG
27/5/2016 05:06:22 pm

But was the car OK? How can I go about my weekend without knowing?

Reply
Retro Resolution link
27/5/2016 05:14:29 pm

Why does contemporary gaming feel weirdly reminiscent of very early 1980s gaming?

Could it be the plethora of often multiple, indistinguishable, unabashed clones of a handful of hugely (commercially) popular titles, appearing like mushrooms, albeit with subtly altered graphics and terminology?

In the early 80s it was due to a mix of licencing being a new concept, of bedroom coders not caring, of gamers being desperate for software. It cost next to nothing for as one-persdon dev 'teams' to crank out a clone, so it all made sense.

Now it's publishers too scared to take chances, commanding hundred-plus person teams, on multimillion dollar budgets, to crank out identikit clones sand sequels.

Very similar results...

Reply
Retro Resolution link
27/5/2016 05:16:16 pm

Damn - why no 'edit' feature!
Apologies for the cut-and-paste induced grammatical nightmares.

Reply
Martin
27/5/2016 05:39:02 pm

4 player squads? Have you played this at all, Martin?

Reply
Mr Biffo
27/5/2016 05:45:49 pm

See, that's what happens when you aren't really interested enough in writing the review itself, and choose instead to focus on some stupid anecdote.

Reply
Martin
27/5/2016 06:54:34 pm

I am sorry for defrocking you so publicly.

Mr Biffo
27/5/2016 07:34:48 pm

I'm always up for a public defrocking, me.

CrispyF
27/5/2016 08:35:23 pm

Jocelyn? Is there a story behind that one, I wonder. I also wonder if it would be a good one to save up to tag on the front of the next "competent but unsurprising" game that slithers onto the marketplace. I'll be waiting.

Reply
Chris
28/5/2016 11:35:11 pm

What do these crooks do with random car wheels, I wonder? Are they like the monkeys in the safari park, collecting enough car parts that one day they will have a complete (yet Frankenstein-esque) car?

I had my bike lights nicked yesterday. The thief had snapped the back light off its mount, meaning they have a red light that can't easily be attached to a bike and is therefore of limited use to them (and the front light would also need some sort of bracket). Also these things are like £1 new.

People who steal obviously worthless things need to be locked up.

Reply



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