Diary
THE
The martian
THE F O E GAM ARDS W A R YEA
Surviving the red planet in take on mars
2015
From MGSV to Rocket League
REVIEWS SPECIAL
The final verdict on the biggest RPG of the decade
OVERWATCH
Does Blizzard have another phenomenon on its hands?
Issue 275 february 2016
AND MORE! Star Wars Battlefront StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void Call of Duty: Black Ops 3
#275 FEBRUARY 2016 EDITORIAL Global Editor-in-Chief Tim Clark Executive Editor Tyler Wilde Hardware Editor Wes Fenlon Computer Large Pixel Collider UK Editor Samuel Roberts UK Production Editor Tony Ellis PCG Pro Editor Chris Thursten Staff Writer Chris Livingston Assistant Editor Tom Marks
GOTY 2015 There’s probably no better time to be on PC Gamer than during the Game Of The Year Awards voting process. It’s a combination of mostly pleasant (but occasionally furious) conversations conducted through the medium of Skype calls and Google docs, at the end of which we had our elite selection of winners and were ready to burn an intern in a giant wicker man made out of tightly woven DVI cables. Y’know, to ensure 2016’s crop of games is just as strong. Did your favorite make the cut? We await the emails typed in all caps.
Contributors Dave James, Tom Senior, Andy Kelly, Phil Savage, James Davenport, Elizabeth Elliott, Andi Hamilton, Angus Morrison, Ben Griffin, Daniella Lucas, Tom Sykes, Ian Birnbaum ART Art Editor John Strike Freelance Designers Matthew Lochrie, Andy McGregor, Fraser McDermott BUSINESS Vice President, Sales Stacy Gaines, sgaines@futureus.com Vice President, Strategic Partnerships Isaac Ugay, iugay@futureus.com East Coast Account Director Brandie Rushing, brushing@futureus.com East Coast Account Director Michael Plump, mplump@futureus.com West Coast Account Director Austin Park, apark@futureus.com West Coast Account Director Brandon Wong, bwong@futureus.com West Coast Account Director Tad Perez, tperez@futureus.com Southwest Account Director Jessica Reinert, jreinert@futureus.com Director Of Marketing Robbie Montinola Director, Client Services Tracy Lam Director, Retail Sales Bill Shewey PRODUCTION Production Manager Mark Constance Production Controller Fran Twentyman Project Manager Clare Scott Production Assistant Emily Wood
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Currently playing Fallout 4
Currently playing Undertale
This month Thinks Fallout 4 is a great game but not necessarily a great RPG. Having a voiced hero can do that.
This month Flew around the country on various adventures, not entirely unlike Don Draper.
Currently playing Assassin’s Creed Syndicate This month Had more game of the year suggestions than anyone. He plays a lot.
PC GAMER (ISSN 1080-4471) is published 13 times a year, monthly plus Holiday issue following December issue by Future US, Inc., 4000 Shoreline Court, Suite 400, South San Francisco, CA 94080. Phone: (650) 872-1642. Fax (650) 872-2207. Website: www.futureus.com. Periodicals postage paid in San Bruno, CA and at additional mailing offices. Newsstand distribution is handled by Curtis Circulation Company. Basic subscription rates (12 issues) US: Digital $23.88; Print $19.95; Canada: Digital $23.88; Print $29.95; Intl: Digital $23.88; Print $39.95. Canadian and foreign orders must be prepaid, US funds only. Canadian price includes postage and GST #R128220688. PMA #40612608. Subscriptions do not include newsstand only specials. POSTMASTER: Send changes of address to PC Gamer, PO Box 5852, Harlan, IA 51593-1352. Standard Mail Enclosure in the following edition: None. Ride-Along Enclosure in the following editions: None. Returns: Pitney Bowes, PO Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2, Canada. Future US, Inc. also publishes Mac|Life, Maximum PC, and The Official Xbox Magazine. Entire contents copyright 2015, Future US, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part is prohibited. Future US, Inc. is not affiliated with the companies or products covered in PC Gamer. Reproduction on the Internet of the articles and pictures in this magazine is illegal without the prior written consent of PC Gamer. Products named in the pages of PC Gamer are trademarks of their respective companies. PRODUCED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. We encourage you to recycle this magazine, either through your usual household recyclable wastecollection service or at a recycling site. SUBSCRIBER CUSTOMER SERVICE PC Gamer Customer Care, P.O. Box 5158, Harlan, IA 51593-0658. Online: www.pcgamer.com/customerservice. Phone: 1-800-898-7159. Email PCGcustserv@cdsfulfi llment.com. BACK ISSUES: www.pcgamer.com/shop or by calling 1-800-865-7240. REPRINTS: Future US, Inc., 4000 Shoreline Court, Suite 400, South San Francisco, CA 94080. Phone: (650) 872-1642. Fax (650) 872-2207. Website: www.futureus.com.
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FEBRUARY 2016
Contents #275
REVIEW
FEBRUARY 2016
Monitor
10 THE TOP STORY
The next Deus Ex slips to 2016.
12 THE SPY
New Mass Effect rumors emerge
Previews
14 Overwatch 18 Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen 26 Street Fighter V 28 World of Warcraft: Legion
Features
30 The Game of the Year Awards 2015
The year’s best games decided, from Rocket League to MGSV.
42 Build your own PC
Our huge 10-page illustrated guide starts here.
Reviews
52 Fallout 4 58 Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 60 Star Wars Battlefront 64 Warhammer: End Times–Vermintide 66 Anno 2205 68 Tales of Zestiria 70 Kingdom 72 StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void
Extra Life 76 NOW PLAYING
What we’ve been playing on PC. Mostly GTA V and Rocket League.
52 GAME YEAR E H T OF AWARDS
2015
30
80 TOP 10 DOWNLOADS Your guide to the best free stuff you can get on PC this month.
84 DIARY
Andy re-enacts The Martian.
Hardware 88 group TEST
Reviewed this issue: mice.
94 BUYER’S GUIDE
The best components you can buy.
6
FEBRUARY 2016
88
THE
30
GAME OF THE YEAR AWARDS The year’s best games from every genre. Including sports. Car sports, anyway.
52
88
Our verdict on Bethesda’s enormous RPG, which has divided audiences.
Tech expert Dave James reviews a range of the latest gaming mice, to help you figure out the one you really need for your PC.
FALLOUT 4 REVIEW
GAMING MICE
LIFE IS FULL OF COMPROMISES. THIS ISN’T ONE OF THEM.
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user reviews Playing Fallout 4 to death. Definitely my game of the year. It’s flaws are just a byproduct of its depth and complexity. Simon It’s going to be a pretty one-sided user review section this month, isn’t it?
Fallout 4, because I deserve to be happy. Also Dota 2, because I can’t be too happy. Sam Hopkins Regulating your emotions through gaming is fine, Sam. Fallout 4 for 105 hours. Also Dota 2 and Binding of Isaac Afterbirth, because I like being abused for some reason. Andrew Preble It’s amazing you found enough time between playing those three to be able to tweet this.
A free Steam key for the funniest or most insightful letter every month Over to you
I’ve been a huge fan of PC Gamer ever since Computer Gaming World shut down and my subscription got kicked over to you, which is how you got lucky enough to get the following question. Now that Steam has sortable user reviews that let me find the best games, why should I renew
Fallout 3, because I don’t have Fallout 4 and didn’t want to be left out. Sarah Wieringa
CLICK
Steam user reviews are useful, but do they detail their attempts to recreate
Shut up, Andy, you’re wrong.
WI N N ER !
I have been playing Downwell and i like how satisfying it is even for a 4-5 minute gaming experience. Leo Loikkanen That’s a funny way of spelling Fallout 4. I’m warming up with Deus Ex: Human Revolution only to be hit by the news of Mankind Divided being delayed. No regrets! Magued Ghoraba On the bright side, the delay means you’ll have enough time to squeeze in a couple more replays.
my subscription next time around? It would spare me from The Spy’s inane gibberish each month, and the money I saved could be put towards additional games. Troy Williams
Fallout 3 did something
I’ve got a bone to pick with the writer of your Fallout 3 Reinstall. In his article, he wrote that Fallout New Vegas was in many ways a superior game. I couldn’t disagree more. It may be true that New Vegas is more streamlined and more polished, but Fallout 3 did something that I’ve never experienced before in a videogame. It had so many elements working in tandem to create a rich, atmospheric world that made you care about it. The quiet gloom of a burnt-out suburb, telling the tale of
LIKE
The Martian in Take On Mars, or recount the time they drowned in Grand Theft Auto V? Put simply, we’re not just about reviews and inane gibberish. PCG
I’m going to pass
As a huge Star Wars fan, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m going to pass on buying Star Wars Battlefront. I was so excited when the game was announced, especially since I’m also a big Battlefield player. To have DICE build my dream game seemed too good to be true. Apparently it was, because from what I can see they’ve stripped so much content, even compared to past Battlefront titles, that all you’re really getting is a very pretty sandbox of Star Wars assets with no depth. It just feels like they pulled gameplay out to either sell to us later as DLC, or to put back in later for the sequel. I just don’t feel right rewarding EA and DICE for giving us such a shallow game. Mark Scheierman It’s a shame, isn’t it? One thing, though: while Battlefront will have DLC, it probably won’t add everything we’d want. Its streamlining seems to be an attempt at widespread accessibility. The downside is a shooter without any real depth, as Andy notes in our review. PCG
the shattered American dream. Fallout 3 paints a vivid picture of the horror of post-apocalyptic USA, and adds just the right touch of black, cynical humor to turn it into a masterpiece. When I played New Vegas, I couldn’t have been more disappointed. It had more bells and whistles, but none of that same rich atmosphere.
Dylan Bremner
Well argued, Dylan. Although, judging by the internet’s reaction to Fallout 4, it seems that New Vegas still has plenty of fans. PCG
SHOOT
WATCH
FOLLOW
A blast to drive
I can’t sufficiently express my joy and delight to discover your recent, beautiful write up for Mafia II. We’re in agreement: that game was sorely underrated. I’ve played through the main game and add-ons multiple times. The cars were a blast to drive, and the music playlist is a classic. Thanks for the shout-out to one of the great open-world third-person shooters of recent times. Ron Smulevici You’re welcome, Ron. Fingers crossed Mafia III will be a worthy sequel. PCG
SE N D
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February 2016
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PC Gamer, Future US, Inc. 1 Lombard Street, Suite 200, San Francisco, CA 94111 (650) 872-1642
O P I N I O N
T E C H
G A M E S
T he P C G a m er v i e w o f the w or l d
THE TOP STORY
Deus Ex slips to late 2016
Eidos Montreal’s sequel is now due five years after Human Revolution
D
eus Ex: Mankind Divided has had its release date pushed back from February 2016 to August 2016, which means that by the time it finally appears almost exactly five years will have passed since the release of Human Revolution. While expressing confidence and pride in his project, Eidos Montreal’s David Anfossi said “as we are now playing through the game in full we can see that it will require more time in post-production for tuning, iterations and refinement to meet our high standards.” 10
February 2016
He goes on to apologize for the delay and for disappointing players. On the one hand, August feels like forever away, but on the other, I was enormously encouraged by what I read in Tom Senior’s cover feature two issues ago about how they’re building
“we can see that it will require more time in post-production for tuning”
on the previous game. The sequel to Human Revolution, I think, has the potential to be one of the great PC games of this age—and there’s no shortage of things to play in the meantime. It joins Hitman and Mirror’s Edge Catalyst in slipping gently down the release schedule. I’m actually pretty glad a bunch of games got delayed in 2015. Imagine trying to fit in XCOM 2 or Hitman around Metal Gear Solid V, The Witcher 3, Fallout and Star Wars Battlefront—there would have been everything to play in December and not a huge amount from January to August. Samuel Roberts
U S E C O D E FO R 1 0 % O FF S IT E- W I DE
PCFEB2015
SIT BETTER. WORK HARDER. GAME LONGER. W W W. D X R A C E R . C O M
OPINION
I
GAMES
T H E S P Y
I
TECH
S
pace holds no interest for The Spy. The Earth is full of fascinating, mysterious and unbelievable things—wireless electricity, Republican presidential candidates and jean shorts, to name just three. Space, conversely, is pretty barren. It’s just immense balls of hot plasma, floating rocks and laserarmed supervillain death fortresses. But if three Star Wars films about taxation, Gungans and midi-chlorians can’t persuade fans that space is a deeply boring place, nothing will. And so it comes as no surprise to learn that the internet is losing its collective mind over BioWare’s much anticipated Mass Effect: Andromeda. Details remain sketchy, but it is known that the game will feature a new protagonist, and a new region of space—hence the title. A new Mass Effect: Andromeda trailer was released for N7 day—or November 7th, as people who aren’t part of Mass Effect fandom call it. The video features a montage of real-life space missions, as well as CGI
The Spy knows what you’ll do next summer.
2
w h o wat c h e s t h E s p y ?
February 2016
representations of planets and solar systems. It’s narrated by Jennifer Hale, voice actor for the awkwardly named ‘FemShep’. An effective bit of fan service, then, but one that could also hide the announcement of Andromeda’s protagonist. Around 48 seconds into the trailer, the cockpit of a spaceship can be seen as it reverses away from Earth. In that cockpit is a dogtag, which, if you activate CSI’s zoom-andenhance software, shows a name: ‘Ryder’. Fans speculate that Ryder is a reference to Sally Ride, the first American woman in space. If so, it would fit. Mass Effect’s Commander Shepard was named after Alan Shepard, the first American man in space. Between the name’s probable inspiration and Hale’s voiceover, it
to be sent by Take-Two,” the modder wrote on Reddit, “handing me a phone with a person somewhere in the UK or US or whatever to ‘discuss how to cease my activities with regard to GTA.’” The GTA:MP team were more philosophical. “Without [Take-Two] and Rockstar, we would not have this beautiful game and the opportunities to open the game for players,” they posted on their site. Hopefully that was written of their own free will, and not with a pair of heavies standing by a computer, saying, “Nice CPU. It would be a shame if something happened to it.”
the management
Hopefully this doesn’t escalate. If other publishers get in on the action, there’ll be a international PI shortage. How will jilted spouses settle divorce cases if private investigators are too busy chasing down the makers of Skyrim’s Thomas the Tank Engine mod? From one Take-Two franchise to another, although BioShock’s PIs remain purely fictional. Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick recently spoke at the MKM Partners Investor Day Conference about the future of the series. “The franchise is in the hands of 2K,” he said. “They’ll make announcements in due time about any upcoming releases. But BioShock is unquestionably a permanent franchise in our company and one we believe in.” Zelnick also teased Ken Levine’s new game. Levine, last seen closing Irrational after the completion of BioShock Infinite’s DLC, is now working on a new sci-fi project. “I’m not going to steal Ken’s thunder,” Zelnick said, “but we’re thrilled to be in business with Ken. What I can say is you would expect that Ken would work on something highly creative and innovative. I think that would be a reasonable expectation for whatever he does next.” The Spy would hire some private investigators to find out more, but they’re all busy hunting the mastermind behind Left 4 Dead 2’s Teletubbies mod. Spy out. The Spy
Alternatively, it means that Mass Effect fans read too much into everything could be a sign that BioWare’s marketing will focus on a female lead character—just as ManShep was assumed to be the default lead for the original trilogy. Alternatively, it means that Mass Effect fans read too much into everything, and that, next E3, the main character will be revealed as smack-talking, quick-quipping space badass Captain Jake Murderstab. BioWare has a good relationship with its fans, but other studios are more adversarial. Consider GTA V’s publisher, Take-Two, who allegedly hired private investigators to track down the modders responsible for FiveM and GTA:MP—both designed as mod-friendly alternatives to Rockstar’s own GTA Online. The claims were made by FiveM creator ‘ntauthy’. “I just got a pair of PIs at my door claiming
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