Craig Flannagan, director of marketing for Microsoft Canada, kicked off the event by calling the Xbox One “the best place to play games.” He elaborated by talking about the cinematic scale of many of their games, that “rival what Hollywood does today.”
The Xbox One pop-up shop at the intersection of Bloor and Yonge Streets, which will apparently be there until December 29 of this year, was outfitted with a slew of TVs and games. Screens showed previews of the ultra-bloody Ryse: Son of Rome, Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, FIFA 14 and more.
On the second floor, Xbox staff showed off Just Dance 2014 and Xbox Fitness among others, the two games relying solely on the Kinect controller.
While some of the demos didn’t seem to be up and running, I managed to try out three upcoming games, two of which will be day-one launch titles for the Xbox One.
Killer Instinct
This reboot of the classic 1996 combo fighter looks better than ever with fleshed-out graphics and characters. The gameplay itself is fairly standard button-masher fare, though slightly more forgiving in that every button-press seems to unleash some type of useful attack. The game will be available for free with an Xbox One Gold membership.
Crimson Dragon
Crimson Dragon was easily the best of the three demos I tried. I got a full explanation of the story behind it; the story revolves around Draco, a planet which holds a population of humans and dragons. A sickness called the crimson virus starts to affect the dragon population, making them more violent and deadly. It also affects the human population, making the situation twice as scary. You play as someone who survives the crimson virus, who finds that he can commune with dragons and sets out to find out what caused the virus and how it can be stopped.
The gameplay itself works well because of its sense of scale. As a tiny human, you mount a larger dragon to battle behemoths that make your dragon feel like a pushpin in comparison. Paired with expansive levels and a compelling soundtrack, it can be pretty awe-inspiring.
There are many RPG elements to this rail shooter, such as earning letter grades based on level objectives, earning experience to level up your dragon and credits to help out in your battle against the virus. Though I started off shaky, it didn’t take long to adjust to the controls and it will likely be a fun game to play with friends.
Peggle 2
This is the latest game from PopCap, which has been responsible for fiendishly-addictive puzzle games like Bejeweled and Plants vs. Zombies. This is a fairly straight-forward game in principle, which has you firing rounds from a cannon and attempting to wipe out all the pegs in each level.
Though simple in premise, the actual gameplay is difficult more or less right off the bat, though I suspect this will only be more reason people will be addicted. Players can also choose a master for each level who grants special, temporary powers when they hit certain pegs. I used one master who could freeze the board, allowing pegs to slide as if on ice, as well as a master who resembled The Dude from The Big Lebowski whose power-up was, you guessed it, a bowling ball.
