The essential guide to Xbox 360 and Xbox One Issue 122 March 2015
Bows. Blizzards. Bears. Lara Croft’s journey to become the new face of Xbox One exclusive!
forza 6 Developer tells us its
amazing next-gen plans
Battlefield Hardline
Hands-on with the shooter that reinvents multiplayer gaming
www.totalxbox.com
Welcome…
to a dusty old relic made new I’ve been infatuated with tomb raiding for a long time. Way back in 1996, those polygonal palaces offered an adult alternative to Nintendo’s chunky 3D playpens, showing how technology might take a more realistic location and twist it for our gaming pleasure. Almost 20 years later and Lara Croft is still at it, as we travel to San Francisco to see Crystal Dynamics drag Xbox One into the Siberian wilderness, hand it a stick and some deer gut, and tell it to fend for itself. The resulting adventure is shaping into a killer treat for Xbox fans – find out why on page 30. Of course, OXM’s treasures are easier to dig up than Croft’s. On page 88 we put the “lara’s latest adventure is shaping Halo 5 beta under the into a killer treat microscope, we talk Forza 6 with Turn 10 for xbox fans ” on page 16 and risk decapitation and worse to bring you the inside scoop on Mortal Kombat X on page 60. And if you do find yourself stranded in Siberia, you could always roll the magazine into a handy wolf-bashing truncheon. Enjoy! Subscribe and SAVE! turn to page 68 EMAIL matthew.castle@futurenet.com Live OXM Pesto Twitter @mrbasil_pesto
@OXM
1
rise of the Tomb Raider
You know what 2013’s Tomb Raider lacked? Tombs. You know what are going to be amazing this time? Tombs! (p30)
2
3
battlefield hardline
the witcher 3: wild hunt
Resident smooth criminal Alex delivers the hands-on verdict (p42)
You’ve heard the hype, now read the hands-on swipe (of sword) (p46)
4
5
the banner saga 1 & 2
25 things learned from the halo 5 beta
Kate channels her inner Viking in this icy tale of survival (p50)
In which we reveal 25 things we learned from Halo 5’s beta (p88)
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#122
contents
page
30 Rise of the Tomb Raider Lara’s had a makeover. Yes, another one.
page
page
20
42
DASHBOARD
News and interviews curated for your easy digestion
10 Windows of Opportunity What Windows 10 means for Xbox One.
15 Vampyr
A game about vampires, doctors and edgy spelling.
16 Forza Motorsport 6
Cars. Look at dem sexy cars. Aw yeah. Curves ‘n’ that.
18 Why don’t you love me?
Kate’s suffering from virtual heartbreak in Dragon Age.
xbox extra
GETTING MORE FROM YOUR CONSOLE
96 OXM Investigates
Even the worst games have some good parts… right?
104 The Making of: Threes! page
108 6 / the official xbox magazine
Battlefield hardline A breakout- sorry, break-in hit?
Numbers haven’t been this sexy since Carol Vorderman.
114 Far Cry ideas
We pitch the world’s worst ideas for Far Cry games. www.totalxbox.com
page
30
“Lara is so prominent on screen, making her spectacular is the goal.”
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save up to 50% See P68
Darrell Gallagher, studio head, on the new Lara Croft look.
features
page
80
30 Rise and Shine
We raided the mind-tombs of the Tomb Raider developer and came out with all this news-loot. page
46
60 Fatal Attraction
A look at Mortal Kombat X with a liberal dose of gore.
88 25 Things We Learned from the Halo 5 Beta
Did you know Red and Blue are two separate teams?
The escapists
Crawl through miles of sewer… or just stab a guard.
previews
42 Battlefield Hardline 46 The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 48 Rive 49 State of Decay 50 The Banner Saga 1 & 2 52 Project CARS 53 There Came an Echo 54 Lifeless Planet 57 The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited 58 Previews roundup
page
52
page
50
The Banner saga
reviews
If you like beards, you’ll love this game. page
60 page
74 page
72
Dying light
Zombies and parkour? Can’t go wrong. @OXM
72 Dying Light 74 Resident Evil 76 Life is Strange 77 Saints Row IV: Re-Elected 78 Saints Row: Gat Out Of Hell 80 The Escapists 82 Unmechanical 83 Duck Dynasty 83 Rugby 15 84 Online – Dragon Age: Inquisition 85 Online – The Crew 86 Far Cry 4: Escape from Durgesh Prison 87 Assassin’s Creed Unity: Dead Kings 87 Sunset Overdrive: The Mystery of Mooil Rig the official xbox magazine / 7
Meet the…
oxm contributors
The people behind, and in some senses also under, the UK’s biggest games mag
Alex Dale
Kate Gray
Emma Davies
Paul Taylor
Tom Senior
Live ChocoboOfDoom
Live OXM Kate
Live OXM Emma
Live Paulus McT
Live Private
Twitter @SporadicDaler
Twitter @hownottodraw
Twitter @emcetera
Twitter @mynameispt
Twitter @PCGLudo
Alex came back from Battlefield Hardline with a five o’clock shadow and a gruff voice, chain-smoking and talking about how he was two days from retirement. Not until that preview gets written, mate.
We made duck fan Kate play Duck Dynasty – a game about exploding as many mallards as possible – and it may have caused some kind of breakdown, because now she’s sobbing and quacking sadly under her desk.
Emma’s knitting hobby might have gone a bit far. She started to knit a scarf a month ago and now she’s buried in a big pile of yarn that periodically makes muffled noises. Still, the work is getting done, so…
Paul went straight from the San Fran Tomb Raider trip to the Just Cause trip in Sweden, and the jetlag that followed turned him into a bit of a zombie. Now he just shuffles around mumbling “gaaaaames”.
Tom wanted to really get into The Witcher 3 this month, which wasn’t too tough considering that he’s already a 400-year-old magical monster-slaying badass. He doesn’t have those magic eyes, though.
Deputy editor
Production editor
Staff writer
Editor, OXM AU
Contributor
OFFICE PLAYLIST > WHAT WE’VE SPENT OUR TIME ON THIS MONTH
Free pie A mystery crate of pies turned up in the office. Who ate all the pies? You can bet it was Team OXM.
Planning Valentine’s Day By which we mean steeling ourselves for another year with zero mystery admirers. Ohhhh.
Totalxbox.com
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Staying up late for Windows 10 Okay, 7pm isn’t technically late, but it’s time we could have spent playing lovely, lovely games.
The internet is quite literally a gigantic net*. And we’re using our portion of it to snare all the best Xbox One and Xbox 360 news, reviews and generally interesting gubbins. (*This is not actually literally the case.) Recent highlights: Battletoads, Battletoads, Battletoads! / Borderlands 3? / Windows 10 roundup / Release dates for Game of Thrones, Ori & the Blind Forest and more!
Exciting travel San Francisco! Sweden! Chicago! …Guildford? One of these is not like the others.
oxm on iPad Which do you prefer: rustly, scrunchable paper or smooth, shiny, infinitely caressable glass? If it’s the latter (and why wouldn’t it be, in this age of gleaming modern technology?), give our oh-so-touchable iPad edition a try. Go ooooon, touch it. Touch it! bit.ly/ipadoxm
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xbox news, analysis, culture, opinion & more
sh a ring is ca ring
Windows of opportunity
What Microsoft’s 3D glasses and Windows 10 push means for Xbox One
A
t the heart of every Xbox One’s operating system there lurks a Windows kernel, curled up in the darkness like a Chestburster from Alien, awaiting its moment. This can be a disturbing thought. Windows? Why, that’s the same operating system your dad uses to write sternly worded letters to the vicar. What business does it have with Xbox, a hip brand for young people who haven’t succumbed to the siren wail of golf and stamp-collecting? Well, the Windows core means that apps and games designed for Windows tablets, PCs and phones can be transplanted to Xbox One with a minimum of fuss, and vice versa – hence, the console’s steady stream of new apps and Dashboard features. It allows the obsidian behemoth to tap into the boundless riches of PC software. At its Windows 10 presentation in January, Microsoft took this overlap to a new extreme. Once the latest version of the operating system becomes available, you’ll effectively be able to turn your PC, tablet or even your smartphone into an Xbox One. Thanks to the free Windows 10 Xbox app, you’ll be able to stream gameplay from the console to any Windows device on the same Wi-Fi network. All you need do is pick the game out of your library and bang – there you are, setting up Destiny Raids in the bath like some sort of amphibious telepath. It’s a cheeky way around the technical limitations of phones and tablets, in particular – the Xbox One itself is still in charge of the processing and rendering, while the client device takes care of control inputs and video. Naturally, this also means that a friend (or a remarkably casual house-breaker) can watch TV in your living room without interrupting play. What’s more, the Xbox One app offers many of the social features you’ll find on the console’s Dashboard, such as Friends lists, your profile, game clips and the Activity feed. You can pretty much run your entire Xbox Live existence without ever touching the console, down to switching the machine off remotely. Microsoft will also bring Xbox One’s vaunted Game DVR features to Windows 10, allowing you to bite off a chunk of footage with a simple keyboard command. The app is storefront-agnostic, so it will happily archive your Steam games alongside Windows and Xbox titles. There are plenty of other Xbox-themed perks on the way to Windows 10 for PC, mobile and tablet owners – the
10 / the official xbox magazine
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FIFA 15 is 2014’s top game
Not in the sense of being the actual best game, but it sold more than any other in the UK – beating out Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare and Grand Theft Auto V to the top spot. Our GOTY – Alien: Isolation – came in at a lowly 34.
Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty due March
The remake of 1997 platformer Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee is soon to come to Xbox One – it’s been changed to a 2.5D perspective, with updated art, puzzles and controls to make it worthy of current-gen consoles.
//Apps and games designed for windows tablets, pcs and phones can be transplanted to xbox one with the minimum of fuss, and vice versa//
@OXM
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Xbox One wins an Emmy
It’s the system’s first Emmy – Xbox Live won one in 2005 – and it’s for the rather obscure award of ‘Television Enhancement Devices’. Sounds like a spam email to us.
operating system includes a new browser, provocatively titled ‘Project Spartan’, which runs Microsoft’s new voice search app Cortana by default. But what about the benefits of Windows 10 for the Xbox One itself? Try this on for size: Microsoft is looking into the idea of streaming PC games to Xbox One. This could be a huge move, putting it mildly – the Windowsbased software market is vast, and while there are control and interface requirements to consider, the thought of EVE Online, Hearthstone or DayZ purring away happily on a console is certainly tantalising.
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All hail cross-platform functionality! It’s like making a giant sandwich out of all your favourite dishes.
The manufacturer is also thinking about cross-platform multiplayer for selected titles. Back in 2009, Valve’s Chet Faliszek described this to us as a “gimmick”, pointing out that the speed and precision of mouse and keyboard control vs controllers make for unbalanced multiplayer. It’s a fair observation, but the rise of asymmetrical multiplayer modes means that this is less of a problem. Step forward, the recently unveiled
The Windows 10 app echoes the current Xbox One Friends hub.
PC version of Fable Legends, for instance – a showpiece game for the Windows 10 Xbox app, in which a Villain player arranges threats and enemies for the others in top-down RTS view. This is easier with a mouse and keyboard, so the most frantic, enjoyable matches will probably be those that pit Villains on PC against Heroes on Xbox One. The same may be true of many current and upcoming multiplayer titles, such as Tom Clancy’s The Division, which already supports drone-vs-human multiplayer using a tablet. You may be wondering why we haven’t mentioned the other big announcement at the Windows 10 www.TOTALXBOX.coM