VIRTUAL BASTION

YouTube Highlights, Weekly Edition #85

And so it is…that time. That time of the week to…to…have some fun! Yes, we are here to welcome in another weekend by celebrating our week’s YouTube Highlights! We are in the thick of things with lots of 3D platforming and adventuring thanks to the like of Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze and Vexx. And if…

Listmas 2018: Most Memorable Moments

Happy Listmas, one and all! It’s that grand time of year where gaming lists rule! We are very pleased to celebrate this blogging holiday once again, and hope that you enjoy the plethora of lists that we have in store for you this month, some of which are themed, while others are of our own…

Destiny 2’s Black Armory Has Arrived

The first installment of Destiny 2: Forsaken’s Annual Pass, Black Armory, is here. Instead of the minor update many fans were fearing, it seems that this is will indeed be a proper piece of DLC instead. As the name might imply, the Black Armory is bringing players a new set of weapons to play around…

Listmas 2018: Most Memorable Odyssey Moments

Listmas is back for another season of list-making mayhem! Santa’s got his list of good and naughty children. We here at Virtual Bastion have lists for more gaming topics than you can shake a Wiimote at. In recent months, I got the immense joy of playing Super Mario Odyssey. Though I had many memorable moments…

Listmas 2018: Top Gaming Moments

At long last Listmas 2018 is here and we’re kicking things off by listing our most memorable gaming moments of the whole year. This list was actually a little trickier to build than I though it would be. Despite having less time to just game than I’ve ever had before, I still managed to play,…

YouTube Highlights, Weekly Edition #84

Happy (almost) weekend, everyone! Oh yes, we are ready to head into the weekend at light speed, but before we do, it’s time to catch up with some YouTube Highlights! And just what exactly has been happening on our channel over the past couple weeks? More than plenty! We’ve been featuring some awesome 3D platforming…

Stalled in Hyrule Castle

It’s not that I wanted to actively quit The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. It just…kind of…happened. I can tell you exactly where things stalled out, too – the second gatehouse in Hyrule Castle. I want to say that it was mostly due to the Lynel, the second Lynel (one was in the…

Pauline’s Coming To Mario Tennis Aces!

Nintendo released a new trailer a earlier this week revealing some of the new characters coming to Mario Tennis Aces early next year. The first two weren’t anything particularly special: just Luma and Boom Boom. Dunno who Boom Boom even is, but Luma is a nice addition; I was starting to wonder if we’d get…

I’m Grateful For: Overlooked Conveniences

Good day, dear readers! Are you ready to be thankful! I can’t hear you!!! Ahem, it’s time to discuss a few more things the Duck is grateful for in celebration of Thanksgiving. Today will be a random collection of convenient gaming features the Duck appreciates that most people probably overlook.

Making Time For Live Services

Ever since Destiny 2: Forsaken came out back in September, I’ve really been trying to put time into the game. I’ve raised my character up to 585 Power (close to max), did all the strikes, got some nice loot, spent plenty of time in the Crucible with my trust Main Ingredient fusion rifle, and even…

Top 5: Food Favorites

Thanksgiving (i.e. today, if you’re celebrating) is a day to honor the three F’s – family, friends, and food! And let’s face it, as much as we enjoy our families and like our friends, food is really where it’s at today. In my household, the day is pretty much defined by festive meals and various…

Don’t Forget About ‘Gooigi’

The Luigi’s Mansion remake for the Nintendo 3DS has been out for a couple weeks now and it’s actually pretty good. Aside from the somewhat wonky controls required by the 3DS, the game plays well and even adds some extra challenge for players who’ve already mastered the Gamecube original. Upon completing the game, players can…

I’m Grateful For: Certain Life Changes

In celebration of Thanksgiving, we here at Virtual Bastion have decided, in the spirit of gratitude, to discuss some of the things we’re thankful for in the world of gaming. As I thought over my life, I recalled several things about my early years as a gamer that I’m grateful for…or am grateful that have…

‘Entitlement’ Goes Both Ways

The announcement of the mobile game Diablo: Immortal has been controversial to say the least. For those unaware, the basic gist is this: at BlizzCon 2018, Activision Blizzard decided to announce a brand new mobile Diablo game known as “Diablo: Immortal,” and it sparked a great deal of outrage among fans both in attendance at…

YouTube Highlights, Weekly Edition #83

Happy Friday, friends! It is that glorious time of the week where we take a moment to share some of the best o’ the best from our week on YouTube! And what a week it as been! While we bid adieu to the adventures of the Kongs in Donkey Kong Country Returns, we welcomed them…

Resonance: Restoring the Light, Facing the Dark

Some of our faithful YouTube watchers may recall that I completed a playthrough of Ori and the Blind Forest: Definitive Edition in the not too distant past. The experience proved to be more challenging and more rewarding than I ever could have expected. And since then, I’ve taken time to replay it…and boy oh boy,…

Co-Op Comes to Tomb Raider with ‘The Forge’ Challenge Tomb

Tomb Raider games have always been solo experiences, and that’s held true with the most recent entry in the reboot series: Shadow of the Tomb Raider. However, it appears that’s changed with the arrival of the game’s first DLC challenge tomb: “The Forge.” In this new challenge tomb, two players can work together to solve…

Super Mario Odyssey was…Wow

Though I’m about a year late, I am thrilled to have finally gotten the opportunity to play Super Mario Odyssey on Nintendo’s newest and most innovative console yet. Though I had a rather unhappy history with Mario’s first 3D outing on the N64, Super Mario 64, that doesn’t mean that I don’t prefer playing as…

YouTube Highlights, Weekly Edition #82

Hey everyone! Glad to see you with us on this wonderful Friday, because it’s time to share more weekly highlights from our YouTube channel! We’re back to featuring just a couple ongoing things, namely 3D platforming in the form of Donkey Kong Country Returns, along with classic gaming in our “Nostalgic Notions” series. With the…

“Fun” and Games: An Elaboration

In my post last week about Red Dead Redemption II, I made a passing reference to the fact that I didn’t think the game was fun. If we take the definition of “fun” in its strictest sense, that which provides amusement or enjoyment, I suppose I was wrong. Because RDRII, especially now that I’ve played…

Warcraft III Is Coming Back

At last week’s BlizzCon, Blizzard made a couple of announcements they were absolutely certain would make their crowd of fans go wild with delight. One was for the now infamous Diablo: Immortal…the fallout for which they’re still running damage control. Seriously though, why on earth would they think that hyping up and announcing a mobile…

It’s Official…I Have a Switch!

That’s right, I bought a Switch. For a time, I had no idea when I was ever going to buy Nintendo’s newest console. I mean, while Super Mario Odyssey looked amazing, I couldn’t really justify spending $300 when I would only buy one game. As was also the case with the Wii, I wasn’t truly…

Rare Scares: Thaaank Yooouuu…

Good day (or perhaps good evening) to all you lovely citizens of the night! Halloween is almost upon us, and that means Rare Scares month has almost passed. They haven’t all been scares per se, but I’d say Rare’s oddly scary reputation still stands. This final scare isn’t really all that creepy at first glance…

Rare Scares: King Zing Sting

Rare Scares is in full swing here at Virtual Bastion, and we’re leaving no stone unturned as we look at all the ways Rare has managed to startle, spook, or outright scare us over the years. Most of the time the scares come from the obvious horror-themed zones like Haunted Hall, but there are time…

Festival of the Lost Has Returned to Destiny

October is in full swing now; this means that Rare Scares is in full effect here at Virtual Bastion and Festival of the Lost has finally returned to the world of Destiny. Since Destiny 2 only just launched last year, Bungie decided to skip the event, and considering all the cruddiness and controversy surrounding the…

Rare Scares: Kackle

Last week I kicked-off my segment of Rare Scares month with the Temple Guardian from DK64. I was pretty sure at the time that that would be my only entry from the Donkey Kong games, but here we are with another one, and from Donkey Kong Country 2 no less! DKC2 is probably my absolute…

Borderlands 2 Is Coming to PSVR

Vault Hunters rejoice! Borderlands 2 is bringing its signature looting and shooting experience to PSVR! This new version features (almost) everything fans loved about the original, plus a few extras to make the VR experience flow just a bit more smoothly.

Rare Scares: Temple Guardian in DK64

October is here and the smell of leaves and spookiness is in the air. What does spookiness smell like? Pumpkins, obviously. What’s not so obvious though are all the various sources of those spooky vibes. I mean, of course horror themes shows and games are going to deliver some scares, but sometimes otherwise innocent media…

Are You Ready to Live?!

It’s finally happening everyone! After 8 long years of waiting, Animal Crossing is finally, finally getting a new console release! What’s more, it’s been five years since its last entry on the 3DS! No matter how you slice it, it’s been a long time since we’ve had the chance to live the chill kind of…

Nintendo Switch Online is Now Live

With the exception of Fortnite, online play on the Nintendo Switch now requires a subscription to Nintendo’s newly-launched online service. Subscriptions range from $20 per year for an individual or $35 for the family plan. Subscribing gets a player access to online multiplayer for games like Smash 4 and Splatoon 2, cloud saves*, as well…

Playing Forsaken While Eating My Words

I’ve not been kind to Destiny 2 or its developer, Bungie, for a good portion of this year. As I’ve said in several of my posts, I’ve been a Destiny fan for a long time, and I was particularly disappointed with Destiny 2 at launch. It was enough to get me to stop playing the…

Hello Neighbor is Getting a Prequel

Some months back, the full version of a little indie game called Hello Neighbor was released. Though I had high hopes due to how interesting the Alpha and Beta versions of the game were, I was ultimately disappointed in the final game because it failed to successfully answer the questions I had going in (namely…

Still Feeling Cautiously Optimistic About Anthem

“Anthem looks interesting.” That’s more or less what I’ve been thinking ever since the game was announced. Plenty has been released about it; plenty has been shown, but I’m still not feeling all that much excitement for the game. This latest trailer, like all the others, shows a game that looks very promising. And yet…

Octopath Traveler is the Right Kind of Simple

I’ve been finding myself drawn to games that don’t require all that much thought lately. I mean that’s not exclusively what I’ve been playing, quite the opposite actually. Now that I’ve finished Vampyr (finally!), I feel like I can act on this attraction (such as it is). It’s kind of strange, but as my working…

Makers of ‘Until Dawn’ Trademark ‘Shattered State’

For many “Until Dawn” was one of the better horror experiences to come about during this console generation. Sure, it was more or less just a spooky walking-simulator peppered with QTEs, but that spookiness came across in a major way. “Until Dawn” sold its players on its atmosphere and managed to send a chill down…

Sunday Video Round Up: Nov 25 – Dec 1

I personally can’t believe it, but we’re now into December. Where has the year gone? Seeing as this is the last month of 2018, there’s only a handful of Video Round Ups left before we go on our annual holiday hiatus. More on that soon, but for now, let’s have a look at this week’s…