Tag Archives: kitguru

If you've ever wanted to review tech, then this is a perfect opportunity as we are now hiring for a new reviewer to join our team! Prior experience is not strictly necessary, but we would like to see some example works from applicants. 

The Borderlands series pretty much invented the looter-shooter genre when the first entry in the now ubiquitous franchise launched all the way back in 2009. Two console generations and over 15 years later, Borderlands 4 is finally upon us, bringing with it more freedom, replayability – and of course – loot than ever before. That said, in amongst all of the sequel’s many changes and improvements, by far the most impactful is its overhaul to movement.

Looking back over its few years of service, PlayStation Stars neither grew nor evolved – and as such will die out being just another failed half-baked idea. While there were few who even knew the service existed, and fewer still who enjoyed it, I will be sad to see PlayStation Stars go away; not because of what it was, but due to what it could have been.

5 years on from Tsushima’s release and Sucker Punch is gearing up to launch its successor – with Ghost of Yotei set to arrive this October. Given just how much praise Tsushima received for its retooling of the open-world genre, it is not surprising to see the team doubling down on this concept for the upcoming Ghost of Yotei. Whether it will ultimately work out or not, we will have to wait and see, but there’s no denying that in many ways, Sucker Punch is trying to refine the open world with Ghost of Yotei.

After years of confusing decisions, WB announced a complete shake-up to the company’s structure – one which puts it in a perfect position to sell off parts of itself to others. As such, the rumours that Sony is interested in purchasing WBD presents an opportunity which could make for a more innovative, interesting and involved industry.

Known for their middle-of-the-road output, Ubisoft has shown a commitment to making sweeping changes to its games post-launch. Unfortunately, the publisher appears to have neither the vision – nor the identity – in order to elevate its titles beyond just being “another Ubisoft game.”

The KitGuru team has returned to UK shores after a week in Taipei covering as much as possible at Computex last week. Here, we share our final piece of coverage - a best of video breaking down the best moments of the week, along with some previously unseen bloopers from our time filming. 

For a while, it seemed as though both digital and physical mediums could co-exist in the games industry. Unfortunately, through the evolution of technology, the de-evolution of the industry and what seems to be a concerted effort to make the overall experience worse, physical media is now in many ways objectively inferior to digital.

Following an explosive and highly popular first series, HBO’s The Last of Us Season 2 is almost upon us. Set to premiere on the 13th of April, the sequel season based on Naughty Dog’s controversial Part II is likely to spark up even more discourse than the first. Unlike 2020’s masterpiece however, HBO’s adaptation has made one key decision which – if handled well – could not only serve to build upon the theming of the game itself, but also function as a different way to tell the same message. That being the casting of Kaitlyn Dever as Abby.

Emulation is the saving grace of the video games industry. Despite its controversial nature, the technology will be the only way in which all games are preserved for the future – free from licensing agreements and other such nonsense. Better still is the fact that in a majority of cases, emulation allows for a more accurate recreation of the game’s original experience than official offerings, due to countless complex shaders, filters and tweakable settings. And the best part? Thanks to the progression of technology, your humble smartphone is able to do all this and more – giving you the power of 10,000 games in the palm of your hand.

The Nintendo Switch 2 has been unveiled and in prime Nintendo fashion, the Switch 2 will include its own hardware gimmick. For the original Switch, this was the ability to disconnect the Joy Cons. For the Switch 2, Nintendo is taking things a step further, transforming the Joy-Con into a gaming mouse. In this week's KitGuru Games we take a look at what the Switch 2's "mouse mode" could be used for and how it could revolutionise console gaming.

If you've ever wanted to review PC gear, then this is a perfect opportunity as we are now hiring for a new reviewer to join our team! Prior experience is not strictly necessary, but we would like to see some example works from applicants...

The KitGuru Advent Calendar is returning for 2024! We have an entire month of daily giveaways lined up for our readers, and it all kicks off December 1st.

Black Ops 6 is officially here, bringing the innovative new Omni-movement system to the game. While on the surface a relatively simple change, I argue that Treyarch intimately studied DOOM and the past 30 years of first-person shooter evolution to craft one of the most satisfying gameplay systems yet.

During E3 2014 on the PlayStation showcase stage, Hello Games showed off No Man’s Sky in a presentation which has now become iconic. Once an infamous example of a game failing to live up to its initial expectations, the launch of No Man’s Sky in 2016 was just the beginning. More than a decade on from its initial reveal and over 8 years from the game’s 1.0 launch, Hello Games’ No Man’s Sky is the epitome of the redemption story.

Concord marked the latest attempt by Sony to capitalise off of the hype and perceived popularity surrounding live-service games. Released on the 23rd of August, the Destiny x Overwatch like Hero Shooter lasted less than two weeks before being fully shut down by Sony – refunding all of the roughly 25,000 copies which were estimated to have sold during that time. In the immediacy following this monumental failure, there have been a variety of opinions on just why this game flopped so spectacularly. While certainly not the only reason, I believe that the primary cause of its failings is simple: Hero Shooters are boring.

Microsoft sold its current-gen console on the idea of delivering "True 4K" and "frame rates we've never seen before". However, when it came time to back up those claims, Xbox has fallen woefully short, with promises being repeatedly broken...

Since its inception, console video games have typically operated under one of two performance targets: 30fps and 60fps. That said, with the release of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, developers have been able to push both visuals and performance further than ever; as high as 120fps. Interestingly, this leap in GPU/CPU headroom has also allowed for the creation and implementation of a best-of-both-worlds scenario – making 30fps largely redundant in favour of the similar-yet-highly-superior 40 frames per second...

Today, I wish to look at one company which for many evokes an extreme sense of nostalgia, bittersweetness and formative memories – but for others, is a relic of a dying age. This is an ode to the UK’s most prominent – yet soon to be deceased – retailer of our collective favourite past-time: GAME...

We often see many writing off Call of Duty each year, claiming that each new entry is somehow worse than the last, only for them to be critically re-examined years down the line. For instance, after having the most disliked trailer upon its initial reveal, many now praise Infinite Warfare for its fresh take on the franchise. This isn't new though, in fact, Call of Duty has been more innovative in the shooter space than any other shooter in the past decade.

We couldn't let Computex go by without catching up with Steve of Gamers Nexus. Leo and Steve met up in the event halls to go over all of Intel's major announcements this week, including the unveiling of Lunar Lake. 

With the most recent COD safely in its mid-life cycle, the launch of xDefiant comes perhaps at the perfect time to try and steal as many eyes away from Call of Duty as possible. While in many ways, xDefiant is indeed competing in the same space as COD gameplay-wise, one might argue that Ubisoft’s efforts have resulted in a product which feels as though it was designed to compete with Modern Warfare 3 (2011), not Modern Warfare III (2023) – and that’s not necessarily a bad thing...

Our 15-year anniversary giveaway officially came to an end last week. We've already announced the winner, but now we are pleased to report that they have received the system, monitor and peripherals. Here is how the whole setup is looking, now all placed in its new home. Lewis, the winner …

With Ghost of Tsushima recently landing on PC, I have been looking back at Sucker Punch’s 2020 PS4 swan song and analysing exactly why I think the game managed to stand out from the crowd of open world titles, with this analysis discussing the purposeful and creatively-dense sounds, sensations and subtleties of Ghost of Tsushima...

Sucker Punch Productions has always been one of PlayStation studios’ lesser-appreciated dev teams, with the Washington-based company releasing some of the most underrated games over the past many generations – including the excellent InFamous series. The team finally received their well-deserved flowers with the release of Ghost of Tsushima back in 2020 for the PlayStation 4. With the title finally set to come to PC, I wish to share with you just some of the MANY reasons as to why even in 2024, Ghost of Tsushima just hits DIFFERENT.

With the rapid rate of technological progress over the decades, many older games no longer hold up to current day TVs and monitors both technically and technologically. In some instances, even modern systems are far behind the curve of video output, with a number of Nintendo Switch titles turning into a bit of a blurry/aliased mess when blown up on a big screen. This is where the mClassic comes in: a HDMI-based hardware upscaler offering “Real-Time Redrawing of Each and Every Pixel.”

Fast travel in games won’t be going away any time soon – and nor should it – but it is interesting to examine the varying ways that developers choose to implement the feature in their games; be it narratively, mechanically or functionally. Quite surprisingly, over the decades, studios have tackled this seemingly simple issue in MANY ways – for better and worse.

While undeniably useful for navigating expansive game worlds, I despise mini-maps and their distracting nature. Are they holding the industry back? And are there ways we can improve on the standard mini-map design?

For the past couple years Sony has been taking a renewed approach when it comes to utilising their many current and past Intellectual Properties, with the PlayStation console manufacturer expanding to a transmedia strategy. First starting with the Uncharted movie, these adaptations have – with one obvious exception – been received both critically and commercially in a somewhat dim light. While a majority of these projects have not quite set the world on fire, I don’t actually think they were meant to...

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