The Eternal Battle of FPS Gamers

Inverted or non inverted.

Everyone has their opinion, and they are all wrong.  The biggest distinction I have noticed between inverted and non inverted is age. The only thing I can think of for this is that games of years and consoles past used to default to inverted. I even remember there was a time when I noticed more and more games were coming out and defaulting to non inverted. 

Inverted is the way. The only way. If you don't play with inverted it seems to be a tricky thing to get your head around, but let me explain the logic.

Joystick goes down, head looks up. Joystick goes up, head goes down. 

Halo, Then & Now

With the release of the Halo Master Chief collection I thought I would look back and reference a few things of note that happened around each games release. For those that don't know Halo: Combat Evolved was a launch title on Microsoft's first ever console, the original black beast, the Xbox. That was 13 years ago! So let's look back.

Halo: Combat Evolved. Release date; November 15th, 2001, Platform; Xbox

Movies; November 16th, the first Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, is released, grossing US $975.8 million in first week, becoming the second highest grossing film around the world, behind Titanic.

Music; November 10th, Jennifer Lopez, "I'm Real" is the number 1 song on AT40

Television; November 6th, Twentieth Century Fox's anti-terrorist drama action show 24 (TV series) premieres.

Death; November 29th, George Harrison of the Beatles dies at the age of 58 from lung cancer in Hollywood, California.

Halo 2. Release date; November 9th, 2004, Platform; Xbox

Movies; November 5th, The Incredibles hits theaters grossing $261,441,092

Music; November 13th, Nelly f/ Tim McGraw, "Over And Over" is the number 1 song on AT40

Television; November 1st, The Young and the Restless broadcasts its 8,000th episode.

Death; Rapper Russel Jones (a.k.a. Ol' Dirty Bastard) dies of a drug overdose in a recording studio in New York City.


Halo 3. Release date; September 25th, 2007, Platform; Xbox 360

Movies; November 21st, Resident Evil: Extinction hits theaters, grossing $50,648,679

Music; November 22nd Timbaland f/ Keri Hilson, "The Way I Are" is the number 1 song on AT40 for it's second week.

Television; November 24th, The Big Bang Theory premieres on CBS.

Death; November 29th, Lois Maxwell, 80, Canadian actress, first Miss Moneypenny in the James Bond film series, Golden Globe winner, cancer.



Halo 4. Release date; November 6th, 2012, Platform; Xbox 360

Movies; November 2nd, Wreck-It Ralph hits theaters, grossing $189,412,677

Music; November 3rd, Maroon 5, "One More Night" is the number 1 song on AT40 for it's third week.

Television; November 20th, Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash resigns from Sesame Street amid allegations of sexually abusing underage boys.

Death; November 6th, Panbanisha, 26, American bonobo involved in language studies (Great Ape Trust), common cold

Halo MCC. Release date; November 11th, 2014, Platform; Xbox ONE

Movies; November 5th, Interstellar hits theaters, grossing (five day launch) $49.7 million

Music; November 8th, Iggy Azalea f/ Rita Ora, "Black Widow" is the number 1 song on AT40

Television; I got nothing interesting....

Death; November 11th, Carol Ann Susi, Howard's mom, from the Big Bang Theory dies at 62 to cancer

Xbox One Themes

Xbox One's November update will bring in a gang of new features. You can find that list everywhere, including

Major Nelson's blog

. This post is not about all that, this post is about one part of that. Something Xbox One owners have been asking for the whole time.

Custom backgrounds.

This update will allow you to take the beautiful images from unlocked achievements and allow you to set them as your background. However this is still not what this post is about. THIS post is about custom backgrounds, or Themes, as they are referred to. You may have heard this term in regards to Android devices. A theme is more than just a background or wallpaper that you would apply to say a desktop or an iPhone. A theme suits and works with the UI of the device in question.

Shown below is a Forza Horizon achievement set as the wallpaper. The reason this is a little lackluster is because it is an image where the focal point is the center of the image. Which when applied to say a desktop screen, where you can adjust your icons, is great, you get a clean center focal point. However it doesn't work so well once the Xbox One tiles are present.

This is where "Themes" come in. As mentioned a theme will work with the interface. Major Nelson posted a .psd template that has the tiles present, which you can find

here

. (Note that the template does not have the time/battery shown in the bottom right corner) Now themes do require a bit of work. You will need some form of Photoshop/GIMP skills. Even with a minimal amount of skill you can produce a great theme.

Below are a few of my initial attempts. The idea is to use the "available" space, the top and bottom slices of free space. Lots of people also add to the Pins/Home/Friends/Store to highlight them as well as the Clock/Battery. I have started a

Xbox One Theme

album on imgur, and I'll be sure to update it as I get more done. (Already have a few requests from Reddit)

Titanfall BETA

A few weeks ago I spent a LOT of time playing the Titanfall beta. I feel it is the first real next gen shooter for consoles. Read on for more details.

Take the good things of Call of Duty, custom soldier loadouts & perks. Throw in some mechs, because when was the last time console players had a good mech game? Then add a touch of Mirror's Edge's free running and a dash of the creep aspect from a MOBA. That is what Titanfall is, and it all works flawlessly.

In a nutshell, you have a 6 on 6 match, that lasts roughly 10 minutes. You are a Pilot and start on foot, fighting along side your team of Pilots are AI controlled Grunts and Spectres. A good match will end with a few Titans left standing.

Free running.

For anyone who was lucky enough to play the '07 gem Mirror's Edge you will not be disappointed with the parkour in this game. (If you haven't played Mirror's Edge I would suggest you find it and try it as they are working on a ME2.) It feels really smooth and fluid. Through all my play time I never once had the frustration that comes with Assassins Creed's free running, where you are trying to run around a corner but keep getting stuck running up a column over and over agian. You are also equiped with a limited use jet pack, which allows you to double jump. This double jump recharges everytime your feet touch down, whether it be horizontally or on a vertical face. This makes scaling buildings a pure joy once you get the hang of it.

Titans.

The way Respawn nailed the mechs is another great point. You get your Titan based on a "construction" timer. This timer can be cut down by kills and Burn Cards (more later) to recieve your Titan sooner but having the Titans on a timer rather than a perk for performance really helps to keep the matches ballanced. Even if your team is getting stomped on foot everyone will sooner or later get a Titan. However, just because you have your Titan doesn't mean you're safe. A Pilot on foot can take down any Titan, depending on the skill levels, quite easily if you're not careful. 

Every Pilot is equiped with an anti-Titan weapon and they can also hop on top to rip open and control panel and blast away the the Titan. It's not quick but if the Titan pilot is unaware you can easily take it down. I would find it amusing to watch a team mate who has a Pilot on thop of them. They would be getting damage markers on their HUD so they would be dodging all over the place trying to avoid the damage, meanwhile you are trying to aim at them to get the Pilot off, they would usually end up being destroyed. Cooler heads prevail in that situation. Stop, eject, your Titan will crouch down, you get a clear shot, unless that Pilot is paying attention and jumped off.

The other well designed aspect of the Titans is that you don't even have to be in it. If you eject or call it down and get killed it will still be useful to the team. If there is no Pilot inside the mech it will begin to fight, AI controlled, actually quite efficiently at that. This is another situation that I found showed you the difference between a good Pilot and a bad one. If your AI mech is battleing another mech it is better to pull out your anti-Titan weapon and help from the ground rather than jumping into your mech. Whenever you mount your mech it takes a good 5 seconds to go from ground to controls. That is 5 seconds that your mech is getting pounded on by the enemy. This point is situational though, as every mech gets a protective sheild when it touchs down, giving you time to get in and situated even if you are in the heat of a battle.

Map design.

The map design of the two maps that were available for the beta were very well thought out and clean. You would think that designing a map for both humans and mechs to travel around might pose a problem. However I never found myself pinned in a corner, there are always multiple ways out and with the parkour it only adds to the escape possibilities. Whether it be running into an alley or jumping through a second floor window to avoid a Titan or to get around (or over) a building and flank another Pilot, there were always options.

Burn Cards.

These are basically a one time, one life perk. You get burn cards from doing tasks, winning, kill milestones, etc. these go in your deck of 27 (I think). You preload 3 cards from your deck while in the lobby. Once in the match you can activate any of the 3 burn cards ever time you spawn. They provide anything from an upgraded gun to an instant Titanfall, and everything in between. Burn card perks generally stack with your loadout perks that are already active on your Pilot/Titan