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Play More Games: 6/24

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Each week in Play More Games, members of the VGH team will chime in on the new video game releases that have piqued their interest.

Randy Dickinson (@randy_wrecked): I hope Spec Ops: The Line is as good as I want it to be. It’s essentially just a 3rd-person, squad-based military shooter about a search-and-rescue mission in a fallen desert city–not exactly a premise that would typically pique my interest. But Yager, the developers, have promised new highs in the use of character and morality in the game, reaching for something more akin to the emotional horror of Apocalypse Now rather than the meathead spectacle of a Rambo movie. Early reviews have been mixed (one critic even said it ultimately felt like they were playing an interactive snuff film) but I remain cautiously optimistic that Spec Ops will bring something challenging and new into the crowded “war games” genre.

Paul Sandhu (@spaulsandhu): Oh great, just when I commit to going through my backlog this summer Bethesda has to come around and try to screw it all up. As if 120+ hours wasn’t enough with Skyrim… now Dawnguard, the first DLC/expansion pack for the game, is being released this week. I do however, think it is an Xbox 360 timed exclusive… so I’ll probably be safe until it hits the PC. One does have to wonder if Bethesda can keep up with releasing high quality content for Skyrim on the PC though, what with the modding community finally hitting its stride.

But I digress! In Dawnguard you get to do VAMPIRE quests and can become a VAMPIRE LORD. Bloooooood!

Honestly I haven’t been following this expansion pack at all. I just know it’ll probably be fun, and has vampires in it. I’m sold.

D.J. Ross (@metaly): The Close Quarters expansion pack for Battlefield 3 is out this week for non-Premium Xbox and PC players. I discussed it during last week’s Hangover, but here’s the short version: four new, smaller maps, two new modes, and 10 new assignments and their associated weapons to unlock. The maps are fun to run around in, but they’re a bit small and they, along with the new Conquest Domination game mode, feel less like proper Battlefield and more like–you guessed it–Call of Duty. With that in mind, sometimes it’s nice to have a change of pace, and the new Gun Master mode (a riff on Gun Game from Counter-Strike and Call of Duty: Black Ops where kills earn you progressively more powerful weapons) is a fun and incredibly frantic race to the top. My only problem with it is I tend to play late at night and the adrenaline rush wreaks havoc on my sleep schedule.

Also worth mentioning is that Mass Effect 3‘s free extended ending DLC is out today. Will this be enough for Bioware to smooth things over with an angry, angry fanbase? Tune into next week’s show to find out.


Other notable games out this week:

Resident Evil Chronicles HD Collection (PSN)
The Amazing Spider-Man (360, PS3, PC, Wii, 3DS, DS)