This Week At Bungie: Predictions for Jan 26

It's time for lets predict the TWAB! I know, I'm excited too!

So lets recap last week first, I think that'll give us a better chance of predicting this week's news. So last week, they told us that there is a balance patch arriving soonish, date TBD. They hinted at showing us what is in store, and they hinted at there being new stuff in the store. As in there will be a spring content update thing. I pretty much predicted all of this last Tuesday which I was pretty stoked about. The one thing I didn't expect them to announce was no crimson doubles, which was honestly nice to hear. (Although I wouldn't mind it being in the weekly crucible rotation).

Alright. So what are they going to tell us this Thursday. I honestly expect them to give us some more details about the balance patch. Information from the devs maybe, or less likely, a date. That would be amazing. And as for the date, I think that it'll drop first week of march, in preparation for the content drop which I think will drop the second week of April. (These are just guesses), but Bungie does tend to follow a pattern. (I honestly hope we get a balance patch mid Feb, waiting until March would suck).

I think they will also announce a reveal stream or announcement stream of some kind which will take place next week, but probably the week after. They have the set up now so it doesn't make sense for them to drop big reveals in the TWAB. The weekly update is just an agenda to help us mark things down in our calendars for the actual news. I don't think there will be much more than that, maybe something about the bungie bounties, but they've pretty much said everything they need to on that front.

Well, that's what I see happening. I mean at this point it's kinda of tricky to predict exactly what they will say because we don't have a timeline. If I new roughly when the balance patch was happening and the content drop then I'd be able to more accurately predict when they would give us details.

Cheers Guardians,
~Ducky

Mirror's Edge: Catalyst - First Impressions

Confession: I didn't play the original game and I picked up Catalyst because it honestly looked cool and I've been wanting to try out some other first person games. I haven't gotten very far in the game, but what I've played has been pretty enjoyable. Of course this doesn't come without critique.

So far I have only played Catalyst while streaming, mostly just for friends, but there were a few strangers who popped in for a bit as well. This adds to the commentary and really flushes out the games flaws. Cause chat keeps asking questions like "but why???"

Spoilers (if you haven't played and don't want to know anything).

Anyway, the game began, we had just got out of prison, which was pretty dope. Then we immediately break out of the walk way leading out of the prison, which was hilarious. We broke out as we were being freed. (I tried to punch a guard at the time), and I like to think that is why we had to book it out of there, but of course we would have had to regardless. So kinda a silly start.

Then we were accompanied by this Icarus kid, who is stupid annoying. WORST PART OF THE GAME. And from there we go around on missions and do some sick parkour while punching bad guys. What more could you want? Right? At first it kinda has a similar layout to Assassins Creed but the games are still far too different to make any good comparisons. So I would only say its like AC because of how you get to choose what missions/destinations to do via a map. Not unlike FarCry: Primal.

After playing a bit more today (my chat and I) realized that everything seems to be either red, yellow, or white, which lends to less impressive cityscape but maybe its significant so who knows. Also there are a lot of cut scenes, some of which are pretty neat. I didn't really have any issues with the cutscenes, but the dialogue leaves something to be desired. Maybe this is just a gaming thing in general. But there are very few games that do dialogue well. Its really hard to take a games seriously when the dialogue is either really over dramatic or underwhelming. They can't seem to find a good balance and the moodiness "we are all doomed" attitude which prevails constantly in these characters just becomes ridiculous to the player because the tension is never released.

So these are my initial thoughts on this game. Overall, its really fun to play cause you feel like a badass, but it is by no means perfect.

~Ducky

This Week at Bungie: Predictions for Jan 19

Hello Stranger, 

I know we are all eager to get some news from bungie about pretty much anything. And a lot of us were hoping that the last TWAB would give us a few details about new content or balance patches. Well, I made a few predictions for the last weekly update and I was pretty close to getting all of it right. The only thing I got wrong was the hint at a balance update. Nothing explicit, but something. Unfortunately we didn't get ANY hint at a balance patch.

So for this weeks "this week at bungie" I don't imagine they are actually going to tell us much. There will probably be something about the bungie bounties and Iron banner, and how we need to go get that sick booty. But a part from that I really only see us getting subtle hints with no fixed dates. I would imagine that they will (hopefully) hint at a balance patch which will be deployed in February. They have honestly been testing the community by with holding it from us this long.

I honestly would be surprised if they announced the next live team event as they probably want to stretch out the bungie bounties as much as possible before giving us anything new. Its always one thing at a time with Bungie. They may announce a ride along as well, but I kinda consider that to be less important. I'm sure it would be interesting to hear about how they made this or that. But for me, its not top priority. Welcome, but not essential. 

In summary, I think they will tell us stuff we already know! How very typical, I know. And hint at a balance patch/new content/adventures. They aren't going to give us any details yet. So be patient Guardian.

~Ducky