DLC #173 - Rocket League - Revenge of the Battle-Cars

I've decided to pick up the pace a bit with Rocket League now. It's a well overdue full completion and I think I can make some decent headway towards the finish line with a reasonable level of focus at this point.

The Revenge of the Battle-Cars DLC pack celebrates Rocket League's roots, paying tribute to Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars, originally released in 2008 in the Playstation 3 era. Incidentally, it was also one of the very first Playstation titles that adopted the trophy system, which also debuted in the same year.

Due to this being a tribute pack, the Scarab and Zippy car bodies are added - both of which featured in the original SARPBC title, and with it, comes a heck of alot of cosmetic additions. These include new decals, paintjobs, toppers, wheels and boosts, amongst other things. It is purely a visual content pack that focuses on customisation, and even goes as far to add a couple of filters to existing arenas that alter the time of day you can play them in.

The 5 new trophies have a mixed focus and look like they've just been thrown in randomly for the most part. You'll have to exercise either Scarab or Zippy for a couple of the trophies, which should emphasise the nostalgia a little bit, but you earn the remaining trophies through equipping an assortment of different cosmetic items and beating up on a couple of bots through the Exhibition mode.

If you're lucky, and work this the right way, you can actually achieve all 5 trophies within a single Online match, and a single Exhibition match. The parameters of the 2 online trophies will require you to both win a game and be the MVP with either Backfire, Scarab or Zippy, and this is easy in 1 v 1 match.

For the remaining 3 trophies, equip a certain decal, topper and boost, choose a 2 v 1 with All-Star bots and roll a game on the Urban Central map. Then, use your boost at any point during the game, win, and you'll get all 3 trophies at once. If you miss any, just load up a new match and fulfil the requirements on another attempt.

This can easily be done within 30 minutes and up to an hour if things don't as smoothly for you as outlined above, and certainly makes this the easiest Rocket League DLC yet.

DLC #172 - Rocket League - Neo Tokyo

In the latest venture of "jumping back into Rocket League at completely random intervals with no logical reasoning whatsoever", we're now officially half-way through the DLC content in terms of packs completed.

Neo Tokyo's main event is the addition of the Neo Tokyo game-field, which acts as a replacement to the previously discontinued Neo Underpass game-field. Neo Tokyo has some sort of cultural significance to Japanese Anime, but that's all lost on me so it's just a new arena as far as I'm concerned.

There are a couple of other solid additions though. The Snow Day and Hoops game modes are introduced - Variations on Ice Hockey and Basketball respectively - and a trading function, allowing players to trade items with each from within the game. Incidentally, this is due to be discontinued imminently and may render a few trophies unachievable, or potentially a bit more difficult to earn, which has some relevance here.

Participation on the Neo Tokyo arena isn't actually incorporated into the trophy list. However, all other previously aforementioned additions are, with a clear emphasis on Snow Day, Hoops and item trading.

Earning the 4 trophies for requirements tied to Snow Day and Hoops are easy, and should require no more than a handful of games on a casual-play basis. The 2 trophies related to item trading - Not so much;

Certifiable - Earn Veteran status for your Certified item.

The "Certified" trophy, awarded for Earning Veteran status for your Certified item, is actually broken down into a small handful of stages, as follows;

Step 1 - Obtain a Certified item, which is earned through random award each time you level up. When I checked my inventory, I only had 2 certified items, so I'm not entirely sure how rare these actually are. I don't play Rocket League much at all, so they may seem rare just by default of that exact fact, but you used to be able to obtain them through the Rocket Pass too. However, certified items are no longer available through the Rocket Pass, and with the in-game trading system also about to be removed, this will also close off the potential avenue of being gifted them by other players. This will, in theory, make them more difficult to obtain, as you're left with just purely hoping on random luck each time you level up as your sole method of obtaining a certified item.

Step 2 - Understand which statistic drives the progression of your Certified item and how many of these you'll need to reach Veteran status. Each Certified item is attached with a specific in-game statistic that you'll need to accumulate in order to level it up. The item I settled on required you to clock up Centered balls, of which I needed 200 in online matches, to reach Veteran rank. Some tasks attached to Certified items will require less than this total, but are also generally considered to be tougher to accumulate in comparison, such as goals and MVP awards, and this sort of high volume, whilst simple enough, still requires the grind.

Step 3 - Accumulate the total number of actions required to level your Certified item all the way to Veteran rank and unlock the trophy. Centering the ball requires you to play the ball to within the centre of the pitch, and as mentioned, you'll need 200 of these to reach Veteran rank. This took me around 10 hours or so, and because you have to clock this up within a competitive environment, the game doesn't allow you to just boot up exhibition matches against uncompetitive bots. This can make progress slow, and I was averaging around 3/4 centered balls per game, so 200 felt a little grindy, and 10 hours is a long time to spend on a trophy like this.

The bigger reason for note, is the fact there may be very limited ways in which you can obtain Certified items going forward, with the imminent removal of in-game trading and the fact you can't get them as Rocket Pass awards any more. If you don't already have a Certified item to roll with, then I'm not sure what your prognosis of success looks like, as it seems the only way you'd be able to acquire one is through natural levelling progression.

The rest of the pack is very straight-forward, but this is definitely one to watch.

DLC #171 - Uncharted 4 : A Thief's End - Survival Mode

There's no such thing as straight-forward when it comes to Uncharted DLC. It's proven to be the peak of the series when it comes to delivering a genuine challenge to the player, and the free-to-play Survival Mode in Uncharted 4 is no exception to the rule.

Survival Mode is effectively a horde-based game mode for up to 3 players, taking place across 10 different stages. Each stage consists of 5 waves, and in order to beat a stage, you'll need to successively complete each wave by fulfilling the requirements set for it's completion.

Each stage can be tackled on 4 different difficulty variants. These include Easy, Normal, Hard and Crushing, but if you're familiar with the typical demands of Uncharted trophies, you won't be surprised to know that the primary focus within this DLC pack is towards the higher end of that difficulty scale, and you'll be competing within the Hard and Crushing difficulty levels if you want to grab all the trophies on offer here.

As far as horde-inspired game modes go, this is solid for the most part, and that's mainly down to the excellent combat Uncharted delivers, which has always been a strong point of the series. Great mechanics are essential to these kind of games modes that focus heavily on combat, otherwise it can make the product stale and dull, and despite being a frustrating experience at times when aiming for full completion, it's still a great game mode which I enjoyed through to the end.

There are 12 new trophies on offer, and the roadmap to full completion has very clear direction. You'll be awarded 10 of these trophies just for beating each of the 10 stages on any difficulty level to any star rating, which is measured on a scale of 1-3, and is based on how quickly you can clear the 5 waves on any given stage.

However, despite a plethora of trophies thrown at you for some very simple requirements, there is a standout trophy;

...It - Earn three stars on all Survival stages on the Crushing setting.

The "...It" trophy, awarded for earning three stars on all Survival stages on the Crushing setting, requires you to earn every star possible (30) across all 10 stages - and in typical Uncharted DLC fashion, this is not an easy feat.

Each of the 10 stages contains 5 waves to beat, and these will either be Survival, Siege, Marked Man, Treasure Hunt or Warlord. Warlords are bosses, and these occur every 10 waves, with the exception of Stage 10, where there are Warlord waves at 49 and 50 to end the game. To spice up the challenge, waves will also come with modifiers. Survival, but only headshot kills count or Siege, but enemies are revived by Saviours in the local area, for example.

There are a couple of important pre-requisites to point out before tackling this trophy in earnest. These are as follows;

• It is not compulsory, but is highly recommended, to be at least character level 40 before you attempt anything on Crushing difficulty. Each time you level up, your character will receive a 3% permanent boost to their HP and damage output, which will both significantly help on Crushing. You can level your character up through playing on Easy, Normal or Hard difficulty variants of the Survival stages.

• You will need to just beat each stage at least once on Hard difficulty in order to unlock Crushing, so you will be forced to cut your teeth on the preceding difficulty level before being able to jump into the same stages on Crushing.

• Collecting gun upgrades to reach level 5 is extremely useful when dealing with Crushing mode, and whilst also not compulsory, is highly recommended too. Defeated Warlords will drop an upgraded weapon, and a weapon to level 5 will give you more damage from that weapon, which is a great asset in Crushing difficulty. You can only obtain level 4 drops from Warlords on Hard, and you'll need to play Crushing to earn level 5 drops, but this is extremely useful for overall character development.

These things are all important to know, and should ultimately be where your focus lies in order to adequately prepare for Crushing difficulty, however, it is absolutely fundamental to success to have good teammates.

Some of these 10 stages are brutal on Crushing difficulty, and this is down to certain factors. 3 stars are awarded for beating the stage's 5 waves within a certain time limit, which gradually decreases the amount of stars you earn down to 0 depending on the amount of time you take to clear all waves.

You can somewhat cheese certain stages though, and you'll find that sitting in specific positions can create enemy spawn patterns that will lead them in a specific direction towards you, which also creates a chokepoint where you can pick them all off at will. This is sometimes complicated by wave modifiers, that force you to move, such as Treasure Hunts and Sieges, which will add an extra dimension of challenge, but on the whole, is a relatively assured tactic.

I did mostly play with random players, and you notice how chaotic things can get when you play with people who don't understand this tactic, and the importance of it to clearing certain stages within some fairly slim timescales. If you've got one player (and this mode is for only 3 players) running around doing their own thing, it creates a level of disorganisation you can't afford to have if you want to reach 3 stars on Crushing difficulty.

Stages 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10 all include Warlord bosses. Stage 10 has 2 of them. This is where things really pick up because they have high HP, wield powerful weapons, spawn in tons of smaller enemies to assist them and use powerful attacks that can down you instantly. You'll need to be able to deal with these Warlords quickly and efficiently if you want to achieve a fast enough time to earn 3 stars on Crushing, and this is where the importance of good teammates will really come to the fore.

I was lucky enough to find a solid pairing to assist me, especially with stages 8 and 10, which both caused me problems when trying to earn 3 stars, and did require multiple attempts. Part of the issue is, if you all die and have to restart the round, the clock does not reset, so the margin for error is practically none-existent and failed attempts will just eat into the time limit.

The approach for dealing effectively with Warlords is to make sure you have the right offensive weapons and perks equipped. For me, the quick revive perk, in order to help revive downed teammates faster, is essential to success, as is the enhanced radar perk, which allows you to see all enemies on the map as red dots. I also pretty much exclusively used sniper rifles, alternating between the HDR and M14. If you play with good players, they'll probably have their guns ranked up to level 5, and will be familiar with the strategies to success outlined above, so when you combine it all together, and you're all on the same page, things will click and you do have a solid recipe for success.

I did spend some frustrating runs attempting to beat some of these stages with random players who just didn't know what was required for victory, and the stage would pass us by as the time limit ticked beyond the 3 star requirement, so I would definitely go as far to suggest that good quality teammates are imperative to unlocking this trophy. You'll need to do your bit too. There's no wiggle room for a carry here, so you'll have to bring something to the table yourself. It's a genuine collective team effort, and even then, it's still a tough challenge, so you will have to be prepated to fail along the way.

However, the important thing to note is, you will succeed, but only if you stick to the correct strategies. This won't be achieved through fluke, or being carried, or without the right approach, so it's important to understand that you'll have to work hard for this completion. It's a reasonable time-sink too - somewhere within the 20-25 hour mark, and some of these latter stages will take 20-25 minutes each time. It's a worthy completion to add to the collection, and maintains the high standards required by the player from Uncharted DLC content.

Platinum #123 - Infamous : Second Son

Platinum Difficulty Rating - 2/10

It seems a long time since - but I recall the Infamous games well. The karmic choice system, the increasing plethora of unlockable abilities and having to collect a bucket-load of shards which was, pardon the pun, Infamous in trophy-hunting at the time, and possibly still is. Despite a new direction for the series in multiple ways, not much of that has actually changed.

It's been over 8 years since I grabbed the Infamous 2 Platinum, and over 10 for the original Infamous title, which was one of my earliest ever Platinum trophies.

Infamous : Second Son, following up as a non-sequel to Infamous 1 and 2, but still technically the third game in the Infamous timeline, sees you take control of Delsin Rowe, the successor to Cole Mcgrath from the first two Infamous titles.

Delsin resides in Salmon Bay, home of a fictional native tribe called the Akomish. Nearby, a group of conduit prisoners are being transported across the country by the D.U.P, a specialist force whose purpose is to eliminate the conduit presence in the country. The convoy is destroyed and the conduits escape, and whilst rescuing one of them amongst the wreckage, a struggle ensues and the conduit transfers his powers into Delsin's body, thus also transforming him into a conduit being.

Delsin works closely with his brother, Reggie, who is a police officer, to use this to their advantage, and take down Augustine, the leader of the D.U.P, and the mastermind at the forefront of the extermination of the conduit race.

I was never massive on the original Infamous titles. They were solid, but ultimately just OK. It's a series, that, for me, could have benefitted from radical change and a degree of reinvention, but Second Son doesn't do that, and staleness ultimately sets in here. You end up just getting a game that feels exactly the same as the original Infamous titles, only with a much less likable main protagonist. I think Delsin is a weak character whose depth only runs as far as a few quippy one-line exchanges with his brother throughout the game.

You still have 2 clear karmic paths to follow, with the same set of in-game actions dictating which one you're steered toward. The same cluster of side quests are repetitively plastered across each of the whole open world districts and you still have to collect shards to upgrade an extensive list of abilities via a loose skill-tree system. Combat, movement and gameplay all look and feel exactly the same, and even the trophy list has a very familiarly recycled look to it.

There are new powers at your disposal that you'll discover throughout the story, in the form of Smoke, Neon, Video and Concrete (the latter is only briefly presented at the end of the game though). These are fun to use and alternate between, though I did end up heavily favouring Neon purely for how easy it is to get around with the dash ability, but the variety and effects from special powers do keep the game feeling somewhat fresh, and they are a graphical treat. Each special power has it's own set of abilities too, but a projectile attack in Neon moves the same way as a projectile attack in Smoke, and a bomb in Video still moves in the same way as a bomb in Concrete. You ultimately still feel like you're driving the same car - It's just the car has different paintjobs, but it is the still the stand-out mechanic in the game.

However, the overall lack of reinvention also extends out to the trophy list too. The game contains 48 trophies, all earned through the Single Player, story-driven experience, and these follow the exact same template of the previous Infamous games.

Just straight off the bat, there is a minimal challenge to be had from this list, and the roadmap is very clear. Beat the game once, ensuring you choose the good or evil karmic path, then beat it again on Expert difficulty, choosing the opposite karmic path you didn't choose first time round. This should take you through to the very end of the list, with a very linear methodology that doesn't require any deviance away from this route.

The karmic trophies account for 23 trophies within this list, which is just shy of half the overall total. To further break this down, 12 of them are awarded for making the relevant good/evil choice with specific branches along the way in the main story, and the remainder are for fulfilling karmic-specific actions within the open world setting through side activities, but these can be easily achieved within either playthrough, regardless of whether you're going through your good or evil path.

The story is also a fairly short experience, spanning across a total of 25 missions for roughly 8-10 hours of gameplay. The Infamous titles have never been renowned for their length, but this is the shortest story by a considerable distance in comparison to previous games.

Outside of this, there are a host of trophies related to the side quests within the game. The open world element is a still a big focus within Second Son, as it was within the previous Infamous games, and Seattle, which is where the game's open world is based upon, is split into 14 districts, each controlled by the D.U.P. The other half of this game, away from the story, is all defined around taking back control from each district by fulfilling a number of side objectives which will gradually reduce the total control the D.U.P hold to 0%. This will clear that district from D.U.P influence.

These include disabling security cameras, tagging graffiti messages onto billboards and destroying radio towers, amongst other things. This will take a while, and quickly becomes fairly monotonous once you realise the objectives required to clear each district are all the same. The big positive is, you won't need to do all of this twice - Some open world games will only allow progression through clearing a certain amount of side content, but Second Son will allow you to go through the main story path and leave the side content untouched to whatever extent you so wish, which is a massive plus point in a game that struggles with justifying it's replayability, but will still require you beat the game twice in order to achieve the Platinum trophy.

The "Unstoppable" trophy, awarded for Finishing the game on Expert difficulty, is the only trophy of any reasonable note here, and even that is a stretch. The only condition that changes on Expert difficulty is the fact enemies hit a little harder, and thus, your health will deplete at a quicker rate. However, the dash ability is the ultimate equaliser, turning out to be perfect for running away from fights and allowing your health to automatically regenerate when you remain outside of conflict for a short period of time.

To the naked eye, the difference between Normal and Expert difficulty was barely noticeable, and even on the toughest difficulty mode, this game doesn't do alot to stand in your way. 

To further cement the case for Second Son being the easiest Infamous Platinum trophy to date, there is no longer any collectible-based requirements contained within the trophy list either. Blast shards still exist, and you'll still need to collect them in order to upgrade abilities for Delsin, but they are no longer incorporated into the trophy list. Collecting all 350 blast shards from Infamous 1? Gone. Collecting all 305 blast shards from Infamous 2? A thing of the past.

The requirement has been reduced to an absolute zero for Second Son, and given the fact these games are so similar, this is a big difference maker in the conversation around whether this is the easiest of the three infamous Platinum trophies as a consequence of this exclusion.

The list does also contain a host of miscellaneous trophies to make up the remainder, though these are incredibly easy and much less grindy than some of the trophies within previous lists. It really is one of the most straight forward games I've ever played.

To conclude with a final answer, I do feel as though this is easiest Infamous Platinum trophy to date, though the bar was never set terribly high to begin with. Infamous 2 peaked at a 3/10, so would it feel fair to rate this the same, whilst claiming it to be the easiest Infamous Platinum trophy simultaneously?

I am going to follow up with what makes the most amount of sense though. Despite having to beat the game twice, as well as regain 100% control over every district on one of these playthroughs, you can still comfortably earn this Platinum trophy within 25 hours. The lack of necessity of having to collect every blast shard is a huge differentiating factor, and is ultimately the reason I can't justify scoring this the same as Infamous 2. 

Even beating the game on Expert difficulty level was a low touch challenge, and the game practically rolls out a red carpet for you on your way towards it's Platinum trophy. I barely came away with a scratch here, and neither will you.

Notable Trophies -

Unstoppable - Finish the game on Expert difficulty.

Hardest Trophy -

Unstoppable

Finish the game on Expert difficulty

DLC #170 - Call of Duty : Black Ops 2 - Uprising Map Pack

After having now played through 8 different Zombies maps/experiences across 2 Black Ops games, the level of creativity is something I have to give out some serious credit for, despite not always enjoying Zombies as an overall experience.

These packs have taken us far and wide. Different eras in time, different references to popular culture and different game mechanics to suit the themes these maps are based around.

Zombies in Uprising is set in within the famous walls of Alcatraz prison, and even includes an Easter Egg where you have to attempt a prison break - A nod to the popular culture of belief that genuine prisoners of Alcatraz island have attempted to escape on numerous occasions.

The "Mob of the Dead" also references the cast of gangsters, all taken from a variety of different mob films, emphasising an obvious theme throughout. It's good fun, and if you understand the history behind Alcatraz, or have a penchant for gangster films, you'll be hooked in. 

There are also a number of different game mechanics added in with this round of Zombies.

For the first time, death isn't treated in the conventional way. Instead, upon death, you'll be given a second chance through Afterlife mode, where you'll control a ghostly spirit of your own character, and if you can find your downed body in time, you'll be able to revive yourself from beyond the grave.

In a clever twist, you can also purposely trigger Afterlife mode in order to perform certain actions that you can't when alive. These include restoring power to perk machines, mystery boxes and traps. You can also access certain areas of the map only reachable in Afterlife and clear zombies quickly with the use of electricity as an offensive weapon.

The mode also sees the introduction of prison guard, Brutus, a terrifying presence who spawns in at random and will relentlessly hunt you down as a bigger, stronger and faster version of the traditional zombie. He's slightly reminiscent of the Panzer Soldat from Origins. Other smaller additions include the new perk Electric Cherry, which produces an electric shock with area-of-effect damage each time you reload and the Blundergat, a new weapon combining the mechanics of a Blunderbuss and a Gatling Gun, which can be crafted from parts at a crafting bench. Extremely fun to use too.

Alcatraz is also a very perilous map, full of close quarters action that can get you into trouble at any given moment. Narrow walkways and dead ends around the prison cell area, confined rooms and even limited space in the very few outdoor areas in the dock and rooftop. There were plenty of hairy moments when hunting these trophies down and it creates genuine tension.

Speaking of which, the trophy list adds a further 10 trophies as part of this final zombies experience, though the overall challenge isn't too daunting.

The Easter Egg is a little bit unusual here, in the sense that, the required steps will strive towards finding 5 parts in order to build the plane on the roof, and once done, launching the take-off sequence to escape the prison. This is one variation of the Easter Egg, and will net you the "No One Escapes Alive" trophy. I managed to get it done within just 6 rounds.

However, the plane will crash land and you'll end up back inside Alcatraz, and instead of collecting plane parts, you'll need to collect fuel tanks to refuel the plane and take-off a further 2 times, which earns you the "Making the Rounds" trophy, but again, I was only at round 9 by the time I'd done this.

Finally, there is an alternative way to complete the Easter Egg, whereby you can break the cycle and experience a different ending than just looping the map. If you engage the plane take-off in Afterlife mode, you'll end up having to revive yourselves in Afterlife once you land the plane on the bridge. However, whichever person is controlling Albert "Weasel" Arlington will revive as a target for the other players, and killing him earns everyone the "Pop Goes the Weasel" trophy.

As I said, it's a little bit unusual, and may need to be done across multiple games, but the steps are incredibly easy, and don't require you to venture too high into the later rounds at all.

However, there was still a little bit of resistance here that lay away from the Easter Egg related trophies;

Full Lockdown - In Mob of the Dead, Brutus completes his patrol.

The "Full Lockdown" trophy, awarded for allowing Brutus to complete his patrol, requires you to tick off a list of objectives where Brutus has to destroy a variety of different objects around the map in a single game.

Brutus will spawn in at random, and is noticeable from most parts of the map. When you can't see him, you'll hear his footsteps and the screen will shake to indicate his close proximity, and if he's close enough to certain objects, he'll destroy them. There are 9 objects for him to destroy in order to fulfil this trophy. These include 5 perk machines, 2 crafting stations, any single mystery box and the Plane frame located on the roof.

He spawns amongst any normal zombie wave every 6/7 rounds, but if you can keep him alive, he'll spawn in with every wave, which does help, as the rounds will climb quickly as you wait for him to respawn and this will naturally make it tougher to survive the longer this continues.

You'll basically need to reduce the wave to the final few zombies and drag them around the map with him. Every time he gets near the objects, he'll destroy them, and all you need to do is effectively lead him around the map to the relevant areas where these objects are located. It does sound simple enough, but you're still having to fight off zombie waves in a very congested map, as well as ensuring you leave a couple alive to allow you to complete the patrol quicker.

I did also find it very buggy. Brutus will regularly run straight past objects he's meant to destroy and zombies waves will just randomly end if you perform certain actions, such as use the Gondola or Plane which are quick ways to get to different parts of the map. Brutus will still spawn in, but a new wave will start, which heightens the risk against the trophy as you're having to compete with a fresh horde every time this happens.

I dragged one attempt out to round 18 once and then died with just 1 object left to destroy, purely because Brutus wouldn't focus on the plane on the roof. As I ran a new wave in circles, I eventually got overwhelmed, died and left feeling cheated by the buggy AI.

I did manage to get it within another couple of attempts, but I have always found it hard to stay motivated with zombies mode when you have to start right from the beginning at wave 1 after losing loads of progress, which goes for any trophy-related challenge I've ever attempted within zombies mode.

It did recently come to my attention that I'm not entirely done with zombies - A misconception I was carrying through this entire clean up process for Black Ops 2 as I made my way closer to the end of the experience. I still have unfinished business with Call of Duty : World War 2, but that's a venture for another time.

DLC #169 - Grid - Season 3

There aren't any valid reasons to make this final review of Grid any longer than it has to be - These DLC packs have been literal copy and paste jobs, with the same set of trophies attached to the same sort of requirements throughout.

Season 3 adds 33 new Career events - Split down as 15 Invitational Events and 15 Track Day events, culminating in 3 Final events for the Hypercar Series Grand Finale.

Again, none of these matter as far as trophy hunting is concerned, and instead, the 3 trophies within this package are related to a further 3 time-trial based objectives.

There isn't anything to specifically mention here, and the challenge contained within is very similar to that of Season 1 - A small handful of very easily achievable objectives, all of which I managed to complete within a sub-1 hour time limit.

The 3 objectives rewarding the corresponding 3 trophies are as follows;

• Beat a 1:47 lap time on Okatuma GP with the Koenigsegg Agera RS
• Beat a 1:25 lap time on Indianapolis Sport Circuit with the Ferrari FXX-K Evo
• Beat a 1:41 lap time on Suzuka Circuit East with the Koenigsegg Jesko

Despite this being an easy selection of tasks, one thing I think may be worth mentioning - And this is something I only noticed right at the point of tackling this DLC - Some of these vehicles are extremely expensive, and you'll need to be able to purchase them to run them around the track in free-play. They can't be loaned, and if you somehow don't have the money, you'll need to play through some of these Career events and earn it. 

The selection of 3 cars required here alone will demand you to have over £4 Million in reserve to purchase them all, so just be aware of that.

DLC #168 - Grid - Season 2

It seems as though the Grid Season 1 DLC lured me into a bit of a false sense of security - After all, what would one more bump in the road be for a game that's just made me oversee a car bouncing off the walls of an oval track for over 200 hours to earn a trophy?

Season 2 adds exactly more of the same to Grid. 33 new events to tackle in the Career Mode, which are split between 15 Classic Touring GT events and 15 Modern GT events, with an additional 3 for the GT Grand Finale.

An additional 3 trophies added also follows the exact same format as prior, meaning the effort gone into including a large handful of new Career events to potentially work through is yet again wasted on trophy hunters.

Fine by me, although contrary to the sub-1 hour completion time of the previous Season, this one stung me a little bit, with a list of objectives linked to trophies that weren't quite as plain sailing as they were before.

The 3 trophies on offer this time relate to the following Season 2 objectives;

• Beat a 1:53 lap time on Silverstone Circuit Grand Prix with the Brabham BT62
• Beat a 1:54 lap time on Sepang International Circuit with the Ferrari FXX

These first two objectives fit the standard already set from Season 1 - Easily achievable within a small handful of laps at best. However, the final objective stands out, related to the following trophy;

A Wheely Good Time - Complete the A Wheely Good Time Objective.

The "A Wheely Good Time" trophy, awarded for completing the A Wheely Good Time Objective is linked to the following objective requirement;

• Beat a 1:40 lap time on Crescent Valley GP with the Aston Martin Vulcan AMR Pro

I've loaded up each of these time trial objectives with 50 laps, which is a standard practice, but never did this in anticipation that I'd actually need to exhaust the full amount of laps without having achieved a par time - This did somewhat come unexpectedly given how easy the DLC content had been up to this point.

I did see the warning signs fairly early though. The first few laps are always used to get used to the car handling and the track, and even though I never expect to achieve the time requirement within the first few laps anyway, they do act as a good measure of expectations - And I was over 10 seconds short in the early going, which made me realise quickly I was potentially in for a fight here.

The 1:40 lap time is harsh. There's practically no margin for error, and the Aston Martin Vulcan AMR Pro is an extremely fast Supercar that is challenging to control around a track like Crescent Valley, which contains alot of tight cornering and hairpins. I burnt through 50 laps mastering the track and still needed to find an extra 4 seconds or so, so I had to start tuning the car to accommodate acceleration to power through tight corners where loss of speed occurred.

I booted up for another 50 laps, and whilst I was getting close, I was still around half a second, to a full second out from the target time, and after hitting another 20 laps, I decided I had to look into further tuning to squeeze that last second out from somewhere.

After experimenting with adjusting the traction levels, and somewhere between another 10-15 laps, I managed a 1:39.82 lap time, and just about popped the trophy, but I did not expect to put 80-90 laps into any of these trophies when I originally researched their requirements.

Time trials have this fascinating aura of hooking you in sometimes, and the trophy reward on the other side of accomplishment always brings out that addictive form of repetition that simply doesn't exist elsewhere. It may have taken me 3-4 hours for this single trophy, playing this on repeat and only breaking away to delve into some fine-tuning, but persistence will usually win the day.

Thankfully, from here, it's straight, smooth and all downhill the rest of the way.

DLC #167 - Grid - Season 1

If there was ever a game that would benefit most from a quiet exit, it would almost certainly be Grid.

I can't overstate how much that main trophy list grind wore me out - Even more so the impressive feat when you realise it literally required me to do almost nothing and still somehow made me feel that way towards it.

Thankfully, the DLC for Grid is much more forgiving, and we can end this particular relationship on fairly amicable terms at least.

Season 1 adds a hefty chunk of content to the game, including a host of new events, presented as an extension to the main Career Mode under a new tab labelled "Season 1".

There are 33 events in total, split between 15 new Street Racing events, 15 new Pro Racing events and 3 Super Hatch Series Finale events to conclude the season. The package also adds a handful of new cars, but there is an absence of new locations/tracks, which is still a little bit disappointing given the fact this was already a big weakness the game should have addressed. The Season 1 events will still require you to use alot of the existing vehicle roster too, so it'll probably feel like you're mostly just replaying the main Career Mode over again for the most part. Same cars in the same places.

I did toy with the idea of possibly using these additional race events to clock some extra milage towards the "Around the Globe" trophy from the main list, but opted against this because I wanted to just settle on what I ultimately felt was the path of least resistance approach, which eliminated this idea from the decision-making process.

Regardless, the 3 trophies on offer don't require you to go anywhere near the Season 1 Career, and are instead focused on completing 3 new Objectives added to the Player Profile screen.

It was never mentioned in the main list review, but Objectives are just a collection of tasks you can perform to earn some additional experience points away from the core actions of in-game racing, and each of the 3 trophies corresponds to completing a specific objective - All of which are earned for achieving a hot-lap as follows;

• Beat a 4:11 lap time on Okutama Sprint Mizu Mountain with the Audi S1 Quattro Concept
• Beat a 1:38 lap time on Shaghai Waibaidu Way with the Lancia Delta HF Integrale Super Hatch
• Beat a 1:52 lap time on the Havana Paseo de Marti with the MINI Hatch JCW

In all honestly, none of these time trials caused me any issues, and I managed to polish off all 3 trophies within around an hour of play. It's good fun to see and use some new vehicles, but it's all over very quickly. It's also unusual to see so much content left outside of the trophy list, but in this particular instance, that's not a complaint.

Platinum #122 - Grid

Platinum Difficulty Rating - 6/10

There are many games out there that will test your sanity levels as a trophy hunter, and they come in all shapes and sizes.

I have lived through many of these over the years, and there always seems to be a way that certain games will continue to push those boundaries to their breaking point.

I've purchased additional peripherals. I've endured monstrous online levelling grinds. I've completed games 5/6/7 times. I've beaten every possible difficulty level ever named - all in the name of trophy hunting.

However,  I can now add to this, the fact I've left my console running idle for over 200 hours in order to fulfil the requirements of one of the worst ideas for a trophy ever designed.

Grid is the first outing for the Grid series of Racing games on the Playstation 4, after 3 previous titles throughout the Playstation 3 era. Grid has always been a solid racing series for me - It might not be in my top 3 favourites, but I feel like it's always offered up a fairly decent experience.

It blends a good combination of simulation and arcade racing, stuck somewhere bang in the middle between the two. The controls are fluid and intuitive, yet require a reasonable level of mastery on some of the more complex tracks using the more powerful vehicles on the roster, and the assortment of cars you can race with is plentiful, with some of the fastest cars offering up the ultimate experience to test your skills as a racer. The locations/track options are way more limited than they were in Grid Autosport, which is a little bit disappointing, but there aren't many real issues with what is an all around solid performer.

 You can race vehicles straight off the forecourt, or you can fine tune them for precise balancing. Luxury sports cars, or steady Minis. Assists off, or assists on. It's a perfect blend of simulator vs arcade that hits the spectrum in the right area, and ultimately caters to an audience of wide appeal.

However, my only major complaint - and make no doubt about it, this is a MAJOR complaint - is the trophy list.

Grid comes with 39 trophies, all of which are mostly geared to progressing through the game's Career Mode. Unlike in Grid Autosport, there isn't any sort of requirement to play online to achieve the Platinum trophy, and for the most part, just simply progressing to the end of the Career will get you the majority of the way.

The "Worth its Weight" trophy, awarded for Earning a gold trophy in every Career Event in the Career tab, is the ultimate end goal, and requires you to win all 103 career events, split across a small variety of racing disciplines. It's a fairly typical model for a racing game - beat a few events within a certain discipline to unlock a couple more, and repeat this process until you reach the finale of that particular discipline. There's also a World Series at the very end to cap everything off. You'll get to experience race, sprint and time attack modes, with different types of vehicles around different environments and stages.

However, the Career mode doesn't really do much to stand out, and to see just three types of races in a Career mode that spans over 100 events feels a little bit shallow. Whatever happened to Eliminators? Demolition Derbies? Grid used to do variety well once upon a time, and the fact you see alot of the same locations over and over due to the short selection of tracks does begin to feel very samey.

Going through the Career Mode, you'll also unlock a plethora of other trophies, such as completing all events in any position, as well as beating specific events on your way to the very top as you look to win every event. It's very generous with it's progression-based trophies, and these do a good job of spurning you on, especially when you realise the size of the overall task awaiting you.

There isn't any pressure to win all of these events on a specific difficulty either. I chose to play through the Career mode on hard, and found the AI to be extremely hit and miss. Some events I found fairly easy, whereas others were frustratingly difficult and required multiple attempts before I managed to beat them. This wasn't so bad, as I knew this was helping me master the game whilst contributing to the overall milage goal required (more on this shortly), and whilst it's tough to put a concrete time estimate on this, as it's not tracked anywhere in-game, I felt like I'd exhausted the Career Mode by the time I was finished with it.

By this point, I only had 4 trophies outstanding, but I knew since the very beginning this was going to anything but a simple case of cleaning up a small handful of remaining trophies, so it's about time I introduce to you, one of the worst conceived ideas for a trophy in any game I've ever played.

The "Around the Globe" trophy, awarded for Driving a total distance equal to the circumference of the Earth, requires the player to reach a total mileage of 24,901 miles across every game mode. If your instant reaction is one of disbelief, then that would be a justifiable response. Let's add some perspective and quantify it properly.

By the time I'd beaten the Career mode, I had amassed just over 5,000 miles, and even this felt like I'd already put a decent amount of time into the game - and then you realise this is only around 20% of the total mileage required to earn the trophy.

So what's the method thereafter for the remaining 20,000 miles? You can set up a race on the Indianapolis Oval and unbind the controller settings, in order to only bind the accelerate input to R2, but also have this option inverted - This negates the necessity to rubber-band your controller. This will allow the car to continuously lap around the oval without stopping for as many laps as you want up to 99 before the race ends. Once it finishes, reload a new race and keep going until you've accumulated the required amount of milage. When I read it back to myself, it sounds utterly ridiculous that this is what I had to resort to for this Platinum trophy, but these are the kind of depths we've reached.

On an oval track, the car will just run around the edges of the circuit, with no intervention required to make turnings or corners. This allows you to leave the game running idly in the background whilst pursuing other things. I did run into the odd problem whereby the car would somehow veer off track and end up facing backwards, which would cause a disqualification and cut the race short, but this is mostly a fairly fool-proof method, and should get you what you need eventually.

A race of 99 laps using the Bugatti Veyron (the fastest car), clocking a best lap of around 1:24, but sometimes slightly higher to a variance of up to 5 seconds, would mean each race of 99 laps would finish at around 140 minutes, which is almost 2 and a half hours. The oval circuit is 2.54 miles per lap, which means 99 laps also gives you 251 miles per race. This means, at 4 races per 1,000 miles, each 1,000 miles takes roughly around 10 hours. In turn, 20,000 miles would therefore take an eye-watering 200 hours in total.

So my main issue with this trophy is just simply the fact it's unnecessarily long-winded, but that leads me into my other major criticism. This is very much a passive grind, with practically no engagement. Would I prefer to race this sort of distance with a full requirement of focus? Probably not, but I think that just goes to show that the game has missed so far wide of the mark with this trophy, because they just haven't struck a reasonable balance here at all.

The fundamental problem is the fact that the distance required far outlives the amount of content actually offered by the game. There are just over 100 career events, and even playing on the hardest difficulty level in order to purposely stretch this out, I still only reached 5,000 miles. There aren't really any other game modes. I didn't really want to go through the DLC and play events that had no impact on achieving any of the DLC trophies. The online multiplayer environment is completely dead and I don't actually want to sit there and physically guide a car around an oval track 99 laps per race for 200 hours of my life. I'm not shy of grindy trophies, but I genuinely don't know if I'd be able to do this if there wasn't an alternative, much more passive, method available.

So the passive method it was - A lesser of the evils situation had developed and it was just a matter of allowing the game to do it's thing, only intervening to restart the race and go again every 2 and a half hours. It was also frustrating for the fact that, I'm still predominantly playing Playstation 4 titles, so I didn't really have much else to work on in between on other consoles. I could have strung this out amongst a much longer period of time, and only raced during downtime from gaming, but in all honesty, I just wanted to get this done as quickly as I could.

Then that was it - A 250-300 hour Platinum just like that. I had the Career Mode for this game wrapped up within a fairly reasonable amount of time. I chose to play on the hardest difficulty level, which is purely optional, and not a condition of the trophy list, and it can be challenging in spots. The difficulty never really makes any sense, and spikes erratically throughout the course of the game. I didn't mind struggling through some of the Career events too much though because I knew I was still accumulating milage towards a greater goal.

However, the "Around the Globe" trophy was a genuine mental blocker for me, and I did put this game off for an extremely long time because I just didn't want to do it. It's an awful idea for a trophy that never should have passed quality assurance. There's a fine line between extending the longevity of a game and just making people waste their time, and this just blatantly transcends that boundary with a massive leap - especially when you realise the content isn't even there to compliment it.

I've said this as recently as the Borderlands 2 Platinum trophy - It's in the blood of a trophy hunter to just simply face the music, and just get things done, no matter how ridiculous the task at hand may be. These sort of victories always feel the best, and sort the real trophy hunters out from the rest. I've never backed down and won't start now.

I do feel like you could bump this up beyond a 6/10 and I wouldn't have any objections to anyone trying to justify that. I do feel like the fact this was a passive grind would do a disservice to those other grinds I've done with games that have required my full focus and attention though, so that has to count for something. A Career mode with a challenge to be had for those seeking one - and another challenge absolutely nobody has ever wanted. At least I can now say I've technically travelled the World though...

Notable Trophies -

Worth its Weight - Earn a gold trophy in every Career event in the Career Tab.
Around the Globe - Drive a total distance equal to the circumference of the Earth.

Hardest Trophy -

Around the Globe

Drive a total distance equal to the circumference of the Earth

DLC #166 - Call of Duty : Black Ops 2 - Apocalypse Map Pack

The Black Ops 2 zombies experience is almost over, and I'm going to end this eternally thankful that I don't have to continuously run through these games solo, ending up failing post-round 15 anymore.

This was a very close runner for the roughest solo zombies experience I've had with a Call of Duty title - immediately behind Moon from Blacks Op 1. It's a bit of a shame, purely because I really like this map, but there are too many inconveniences that breach that gap between challenging and frustrating.

Just like Buried, there are layers to Origins that aren't initially apparent to the naked eye. You start amongst the thick of a World War trench network, full of bunkers connected by tunnels, with a couple of extra key areas thrown in for variety. These include a church that hosts a World War tank you can ride around the map and an Excavation Site right in the middle, which is the epicentre of the hidden world.

Below the Excavation site, you'll see a shrine which gives you access to one of the big additions to this package - the elemental staffs - which come in 4 flavours. These are Wind, Fire, Ice and Lightening, and once crafted, can be powerfully wielded with the relevant theme assigned to the staff. This area also contains a Portal to another world where you can enchant the staffs from within, making them even more powerful, and the trophies lean heavily on this whole game mechanic. The map contains alot of depth once you scratch the surface.

The blend of World War with Sci-Fi is an interesting crossover, but it's a great testament to what is ultimately the biggest strength that Zombies has - creativity. There are tons of other interesting differences too. Power around the map is now sourced from 6 generators rather than an an individual switch, which are also responsible for accessing the mystery box and perk machine within close enough proximity to it. Zombie blood is a new droppable power-up, which throws zombies off your scent and effectively makes you invisible for a certain amount of time. The Maxis Drone is a craftable item which floats around, half the time a murderous killing device, cutting down zombies with firepower, and half the time a revival tool which can hover and revive downed teammates.

However, some of the unique challenges the player will face from this map also come from some of the newly added mechanics. The giant robot that towers above the map and patrols it looks very cool, but will also suddenly stop you in your tracks by crushing you with it's massive feet unexpectedly at times. The muddy trenches will also slow player movement down, making it hard to escape hordes or transverse the map smoothly. There is also a new addition of the Panzer Soldat enemy, which looks a little bit like the Big Daddy from Bioshock, and will chase you round the map, using abilities such as a claw that can grab you from range and pull you backwards, and a flamethrower that will burn you to death.

When you're trying to survive and keep runs alive in the name of earning trophies, these mechanics become an annoying inconvenience, and I succumbed to all of them at least a couple of times each when striving for progress towards some of the trophies that required venturing into deeper rounds.

There are 10 new trophies added, and again, the formula is still the same. A handful of miscellaneous tasks that aren't that challenging, with a couple that are. There is a focus on the new elemental staffs, with trophies awarded for building and wielding all 4 of them in one game. You'll need to do these steps as a standard part of the Easter Egg, but absolutely have to make sure that everyone in the party exchanges staffs at some point so everyone can wield them. This is crucial to remember, and should be a added step to completing the Easter Egg properly before you end the game.

However, the harder trophies in this set really do ramp up the difficulty, and it also contains the toughest Easter Egg within the Blacks Op 2 DLC;

Little Lost Girl - In Origins, release Samantha.
Overachiever - In Origins, Complete all 4 Challenges in one game.

The "Little Lost Girl" trophy, awarded for releasing Samantha, is the Easter Egg for this DLC pack, and is by far the toughest out of all of them.

The main reason it's the toughest is simply because it required our party of 4 people to reach round 24 before we managed to complete the final step for the trophy to unlock, which took us around 4 hours in total. I began this at 2AM and finished just shy of 6AM, which was extremely tiring, so I'm glad I had a competent team to compensate for myself running on fumes by the end of this process.

Just by way of a quick side note, it is actually possible to achieve this Easter Egg solo, but after doing some careful research, I opted against this - It's even more time consuming and will require you to reach a much higher round than 24, and I just don't have the confidence to gamble on my solo ability to that extent.

The Easter Egg also requires alot of preliminary work before you actually begin the proper steps to completing it. You'll need to build all 4 elemental staffs, which requires finding 16 different parts, and some of these parts are randomly dropped by zombies, so you may have to slug through a handful of waves in order to find them all. Once this is complete, you'll then need to upgrade them to their ultimate forms. The Easter Egg is heavily reliant on the staffs, and they're used for multiple steps within this process, but finding all 16 parts and upgrading them to their ultimate forms feels like an Easter Egg in it's own right.

In comparison to the other Easter Eggs within these DLC packs, this is absolutely the most demanding. It's a long way off completing the Die Rise Easter Egg, which, by comparison, was casually wrapped up within 5 rounds.

The "Overachiever" trophy, awarded for Completing all 4 challenges in one game, is also a fairly big demand, especially for anyone who tackles this in solo zombies, such as myself.

It's best to break down the challenges and go through them one by one;

• Activate all 6 generators in 1 game

This one isn't too bad. The generators have a cost, but they're cheap at 200 points and you also don't need to worry if the templar zombies take one of them of back - Once you've activated one, it'll count for the remainder of the game. It can get a bit hairy in later rounds, as templar zombies will come at you along with regular zombies, and some of the generators will require you to spend money clearing debris to reach them, which will naturally come with later progression.

• Get 115 Headshots

I think this is the toughest challenge, and definitely conditional of the fact that you make sure you're very thorough within the early rounds when the zombie hordes aren't as hectic. You can buy the M16, which is a single shot rifle, from the starting room, which will give you precise headshots very early. Once the hordes start to build, and you don't get the chance to be as accurate, it can become harder to accumulate headshots, and you'll probably need a high powered LMG to get the job done effectively. You'll reach a point where crowd control becomes essential, so weapons like the Raygun are preferred, but also won't give you headshot kills, so you've got to ensure you strike the right balance

• Spend 30,000 Points

This one can also be tough. Accumulating 30,000 points isn't too hard, but spending them can be an issue. Spinning the mystery box infinitely to the cost of 950 points per spin was my chosen tactic, and clearing debris will be helpful too. The only issue with this is the fact that it'll be limited, as will buying perks, and the mystery box is the only points-deducting activity you can perform indefinitely in order to reach the 30,000 points total.

• Fill 4 chests

This one isn't too bad, but will require a total of 80 kills. The 4 chests, placed in specific locations across the map, will fill when a zombie is killed near it. 20 kills are required to fill a chest to it's maximum capacity. This creates alot of close quarter encounters, and you'll need to ensure you don't get cornered or pinned in, so it's vital to be aware of your surroundings. The chest locations are also all located within muddy trenches, which slows your movement down. I tried to tandem this step with the 115 headshots, as it made sense to accumulate these at the same time.

The strategy I settled on eventually was as follows;

1.Turn on all 6 generators first whilst actively accumulating headshots in the lower rounds, opening up all avenues to each generator in order to clear the way whilst beginning to spend points - It was also critical to pull some decent weapons from the mystery box by the time the final few generators were turned on.

2. Fill the 4 chests in their relevant areas whilst trying to accumulate headshots, but just making sure the hordes were controlled as a priority as not to become overwhelmed and fail the run. Ideally grab the Juggernaught perk by this point too.

3. Survive rounds in order to build up enough points to spend them all, accumulate headshots at any opportunity and use these points to infinitely spin the mystery box.

This did eventually work for me, but it took me 6 attempts. Most of my deaths occurred somewhere between steps 2 and 3, usually trying to squeeze for headshots in higher rounds and being chased by chaotic hordes, making accumulation progressively difficult. I did also die whilst spinning the mystery box in step 3 within a location that didn't have an exit from a horde of zombies that pinned me in. Annoying.

I would reach somewhere between round 10-15 per attempt, and my successful run was actually at round 16. Not bad for someone who generally hates embracing the challenge of solo zombies, but I knew it would only be a matter of time once I'd developed a sound plan and just shown a bit of patience by sticking with it.

The zombies challenge in Black Ops 2 does reach it's peak here, and I've spent way more time on this map than any other - I would actually possibly go as far to suggest I've spent more time with Origins than the other 3 zombies maps combined. The Easter Egg hits differently here, thanks to it's complexity and length and the challenge from the "Overachiever" trophy is the toughest out of any trophy within any pack outside of the Easter Eggs.