Dreadnought
If I could award a “Game of the Day” it would probably go to Dreadnought. I played this at Pax East, and at that time, the build had five ship classes, one of each, no customization options and two match types. Today the two matches are still there, but now there are fifteen ships and tons (and I mean TONS) of customization choices, from ship colors to weapons to skills for the commanders. It really had it all. There is so much more going on than what I saw earlier this year, and they aren’t even ready for beta. I could hear the “DREAD… NOUGHT!!” chants across the floor as people flooded to play the space shooter. The ship combat is terrific, and you literally cannot do it wrong; whatever style of gameplay you want from your ship, you can do it. Do you want a battleship that launches a nuclear warhead? Do it! It’s so gratifying to watch it launch, or to watch the Vulture Missile ports open, or even the bays for tiny fighters to launch. So many intricate details going on here, I can’t even say them all.
But what makes this so important? Dreadnought is an FPS. Yes, you heard that right. A spaceship First Person Shooter. I do not think there is anything on the market at all that comes close to filling this role. Let’s face it: space ships are awesome. Spaceship combat is awesome. Why is this such an untapped market? They said in an interview that it’s incredibly hard to do, but it’s well worth it. They were such a pleasure to work with and there is a video interview that will be coming along soon! Dreadnought will be going into beta in early 2016, but you can sign up now at playdreadnought.com! The game modes are incredibly fun and the ship on ship action was intense. Not all ships were fast, but you can divert power to the engines and move a bit faster, and it was gratifying, to say the least to turn starboard, open a series of ports and send a barrage of rockets and lasers flying at someone, or drop a repair bot to save my buddies while preparing a trap for incoming enemy ships. This game is going to be a standout and I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you again to watch out for it.
There were so many amazing things I saw today, I couldn’t possibly cover them all here. Warhammer: Vermintide is tremendous, and I had a blast checking out the swarm of Skaven, as I splattered them across a desolate city. Every playthrough is different, from patrols to item drops, and it’s a fun multiplayer action game where bots can join you until your friends are ready; if they have to go, bots will take over again! Much love to the Vermintide devs. Neverwinter on Xbox One is looking strong and the upcoming Sword Coast/Elemental Evil update is going to be mind blowing. I’d also like to take time to point out that Bottom Tier had a fantastic showing at the Gigantic Event, where DizzyPW stood in as an official Bottom Tier member and we single-handedly carried our team on our broad-ass shoulders and won the game; we have video proof! There was also a meeting with the Trion games folks as they revealed a series of announcements for their titles, and that’s where Darren is taking over!
