All the hype in the world couldn’t save No Man’s Sky from the inevitable backlash. In fact, the hype is exactly why many gamers are disappointed in the final product — a game that somehow manages to become repetitive despite the fact that it offers a nearly limitless universe with 18 quintillion planets to explore.
Thankfully, the developers aren’t done with it yet.
Ever since launch, developer Hello Games has been pumping out patches at a fairly rapid pace. Regardless of whether players liked the game or not, there were some major bugs and glitches that needed fixing, which is why Hello Games has hired a community management team and released four patches a piece for both PC and PS4 since the game launched on August 9th.
The game is now significantly more stable than it was a month ago, but despite the fact that the latest patch has fixed 90% of the crash issues, Hello Games isn’t going to stop working on No Man’s Sky any time soon.
“What matters now, as always, is what we do rather than what we say,” said the dev team in a recent blog post. “We’re developers, and our focus is first on resolving any issues people have with the game as it is, then on future free updates which will improve, expand and build on the No Man’s Sky universe.”
Managing director Sean Murray said in a post regarding the launch day patch that the ability to build bases and own giant space freighters would be coming soon, so once the bugs are all patched, the new features can begin rolling in.
LMAOBOX finally detected by Valve’s anti-cheat software.
LMAOBOX is a program designed to allow players to cheat at Team Fortress 2, for instance by adding automatic aiming or removing weapon recoil. Somehow – until now at least – it’s managed to pass under the radar of Valve’s VAC (Valve Anti-Cheat) technology, but LMAOBOX has finally been detected, despite claims on the website that it was VAC-proof. And with the detection, comes a wave of VAC bans. It’s not clear exactly how many people have been affected, but it includes nearly 170 professional players in the TF2 UGC league. Here’s a full list of the competitive players affected, in a Google doc seemingly sent to the players themselves.
PCGamesN has a good write-up of proceedings, but a few more details have come to light since publication. While the developer of LMAOBOX apparently stated that they would now quit the project and make the source code public, a moderator of this Reddit thread reckons that post was made by someone else, and that the (fake) code provided was riddled with malware. Others have disputed claims that the bans are backdated to anyone who has used LMAOBOX in the previous two years, suggesting it has only hit players who have used it in the last two weeks instead.
Either way, this is surely good news for anyone who plays TF2 in the traditional, non-cheaty manner. (Ta, mxdwm.com)
Overwatch is now entering open beta, soon to be released on May 24, and its cast of heroes is now locked down. 21 men, women, robots and every combination therein are available and if you’re just jumping in it can be a bit confusing. In Blizzard style, all of them are viable, but a few pointers will help you on your way to better scores, more kills and wins, wins, wins. The roster won’t be changing before release, plus likely not for a while afterwards, so now’s the perfect time to start picking favourites. Below you’ll find descriptions and videos for each hero, broken up by their role as offense, defense, support or tank, as well as recommendations for who to start as, an alternate and one to grind away at for high-skill, flashy plays. Remember that Overwatch is a game of hero switch and counter-picking, so locking yourself into one hero for a match isn’t always the best move.
Overwatch Offense Heroes
Best offense hero to start with: Soldier: 76
Primary: Heavy Pulse Rifle – A rapid-fire machine gun, accurate and damaging. Have you played an FPS? If so, you know what this is.
Secondary: Helix Rockets – An underslung rocket-launcher that fires three spiraling projectiles at once. Deals heavy damage. Shift: Sprint – 76 can eschew his other abilities and shooting to move faster until cancelled. E Ability: Biotic Field – Drops a device on the ground that produces a healing field for a short period. Effects allies. Ultimate: Tactical Visor – 76 gains perfect auto-aim for a short time for anything in his vision. Effects both the primary and secondary fire modes.
76 is clearly aimed at the more standard FPS player, and that makes him a really good starting point whether you’ve got 1,000 hours in Call of Duty or are jumping in from a life of World of Warcraft and Diablo. His two fire modes operate similarly to popular CoD weapons, his sprint functions in the same way and he can self-heal whenever he likes, with the added bonus it helps out team-mates as well. The auto-aiming ultimate is a nice touch, and has massive potential while requiring good timing to use effectively. His ability to headshot with every bullet means obscene damage is accessible with decent aim, but so long as you can point ‘n’ shoot you’ll be helping out your team. His sprint lets you explore more easily and his heals mean you’ll persist through spotty bits of damage. A great all-rounder.
Alternately: Pharah
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Primary: Rocket Launcher – It’s a rocket launcher, you do not need it explained. In Overwatch’s world of hit-scan, it’s not at its strongest, but good aim and leading the target will mean great damage. Shift: Jump Jet – Launches Pharah high into the air, letting her reposition or get a tactical advantage. E Ability: Concussive Blast – A wrist-mounted weapon that pushes enemies away from the impact point. Ultimate: Barrage – Immobilises Pharah wherever she is and fires a stream of rockets. Very good AoE damage and can be used in the air.
Pharah’s just rad as hell, with a combo of high-explosive weaponry and the ability to actually fly. She’s good for a beginner because her rockets put out good damage and she’s able to escape most basic situations with a quick blast off. She’s also harder to play than it looks, not least because her rockets are not easy to hit outside of close-range, but put a bit of time in and you’ll nail them. Learning likely routes of enemies, exploiting choke-points and finding positions where you’re harder to dodge but unlikely to be killed is the challenge. A well-timed ultimate is doom for an entire enemy team, but don’t be afraid to pop it out for a quick double-kill from a disadvantaged situation – it builds quickly with all this AoE damage.
Get really good with: Genji
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Primary: Shuriken – Three shurikens fired with perfect accuracy one after the other in a burst. Secondary: Shuriken Fan – Throws all three in a spread, meaning big damage on a single target up close or spread across medium range. Shift: Swift Strike – A dashing attack that passes through enemies, dealing damage. Refreshes its cooldown when you get a kill. E Ability: Deflect – Genji reflects all projectiles fired at him for a short duration, aiming them with the crosshair. Ultimate: Dragonblade – Draws a katana that deals serious damage in a wide arc in front of him, but only at melee range. Deflect and Swift Strike are still usable.
Genji is real fun to play. He’s fast, he can climb walls in the same way as his brother (ooo, plot) Hanzo and does good damage with his shurikens at any range. However, at that key distance where he can connect with Swift Strike for killing blows but still escape on the other side is where he thrives. Deflect is effectively invulnerability except against key heroes, and timing it well is vital. Dragonblade completely changes his playstyle, but he doesn’t need it to be effective and scary. However, with a non-hitscan weapon that does incredible burst damage and some of the most movement tools in the game, don’t expect to dominate in your first game, or even your first ten. Genji’s one to experiment with in every situation, on every map, until you know exactly what his capabilities are – oh, and practice, practice, practice for those sweet triple-tap headshots.
Others:
Tracer
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Primary: Pulse Pistols – Two rapid-fire, short range pistols that do heavy damage. Shift: Blink – Tracer teleports a short distance in the direction she’s moving. Cannot gain height. E Ability: Recall – Tracer time travels a few seconds backwards, returning to her position and health at that time. Ultimate: Pulse Bomb – A high-power sticky bomb that detonates after a short moment. Will stick to enemies as well as floors or walls.
Overwatch’s poster child and fan favourite, the only thing not to love about Tracer is her horrifying accent. She’s super fast and can dash about the terrain very easily. Canny use of her rewind means easy escapes and she’s got all the damage on single or multiple targets she needs when her abilities are up. There’s a high skill ceiling just in maximising the damage from her pistols, which only allow for a second or so of fire before they need to be reloaded. She’s at her best against unaware foes she can pick off, but she’s got use operating as a scout and harasser rather than actual killer. Definitely lands a close second to Genji in skill-testing, and getting into a zone with her will make you feel invulnerable and like the best player on the planet.
McCree
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Primary: Peacekeeper – Standard six-shooter revolver that packs a decent punch but has damage drop off at long range. Secondary: Peacekeeper Rapid-Fire – Less accurate but faster firing version, where McCree unloads an entire clip in quick succession. Shift: Combat Roll – A quick dodge that also reloads ammunition on the Peacekeeper. E Ability: Flashbang – A short-range contact grenade that stuns everyone around its explosion for a short time. Ultimate: Deadeye – McCree’s movement speed drops significantly as he draws a bead on each enemy in sight. Once he has one or more lined up, he can shoot to kill all of them. Higher health targets take longer to focus on, but can be shot early to just do a bit of damage.
McCree’s had a difficult life, as far as Overwatch characters go. Initially one of the most broken characters in the game due to his infinite range, semi-rapid-fire, high-damage pistol, he’s been brought back more into a close-to-mid skirmishing role via the magic of damage fall-off. Don’t get me wrong, he’s as strong as anyone with the right person behind the controls, but he’s got an identity problem when it comes to what exactly he’s for. His kit is the most inter-dependent, McCree’s that keep all their abilities up being far more deadly than those that use them willy-nilly. Flashbang into right click into roll into right click is your combo, but there’s a humongous rift of difference between a McCree that can hit consistant headshots with left-clicks and ones that rely on the rest of him.
Reaper
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Primary: Hellfire Shotguns – A pair of shotguns that do obscene damage at close range. Shift: Wraith Form – Turns Reaper into a shadow for a short period, making him immune to damage and able to pass through enemies. He is not invisible and cannot use other abilities, however. E Ability: Shadow Step – A long range teleport that allows Reaper to reappear at any location he can see after a short wind-up. Ultimate: Death Blossom – Moves to a third-person camera as Reaper rapidly unloads his shotguns in every direction, dealing massive damage to anyone around him. Allows for movement but not use of other moves.
Reaper’s got no interest in this concept of “long range” he’s heard people mentioning and every part of his kit is about getting in close and getting out of scrapes after the damage is dealt. Hell to deal with in a tight corridor, playing Reaper well is about maximising the time spent in these advantaged situations and using Shadow Step smartly to get around. Wraith Form is good for setting up the ultimate, but its main use should be for a quick exit and repositioning when outgunned. The absolute best counter to most tanks, he can rumble with basically anyone once he gets up close – the key is to keep yourself as healthy as possible, and try to take a series of one vs. ones rather than packs. If you do get caught, focus squishier enemies with a couple of headshots to grab their dropped health globes first, especially as they usually do the most damage. Definitely another good pick for the beginner.
Overwatch Defense Heroes
Best defense hero to start with: Junkrat
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Primary: Frag Launcher – Fires explosive, bouncing grenades that detonate on impact with an enemy or after a short time. Shift: Concussion Mine – Places a remote detonated mine that flings whoever’s hit by the explosion high into the air. Useful for reaching out of the way places as well as killing or moving enemies. Secondary: Detonate Concussion Mine E Ability: Steel Trap – Throws out a bear trap that will briefly immobilise and deal small damage to the first enemy to run over it. Ultimate: RIP-Tire – After a short wind-up, gives control over to a 10-second fuse remote explosive that rolls along the ground. Can be detonated but has a relatively small health pool that causes it to disintegrate without effect.
Overwatch’s answer to the Demoman, Junkrat has a suite of AoE abilities for reducing opponents to wreckage, rubble and ruin. Damage is easy to come by with so many ways to deal it in an area, and even dying can be a quick way to put out some punishment – we’ve all had plays of the game where we died in just the right spot, dropped our grenades and watched the enemy team run over them. His ultimate is wonderful, clambering up and over walls to attack from odd directions. For noobies, he represents good area denial and aiming can be mostly secondary, at least to begin with. Plenty of tricks to learn with his self-propelling det charge, as well as exact grenade arcs to hit sweet shots.
Alternately: Bastion
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Primary: Configuration: Recon – Bastion’s normal mode, where he is equipped with a sub-machine gun. Secondary: Configuration: Sentry – A stationary mode that increases Bastion’s firepower dramatically and gives him some armour, as well as a weak-spot on his back. Shift: Reconfigure – Switches between the primary and secondary mode. E Ability: Self-Repair – A channelled heal that lasts as long as you like. Bastion cannot move or fire during it. Ultimate: Configuration: Tank – A timed mode that turns you into a tank. Gives a long range explosive cannon. Obscene damage.
The cutest robot this side of late 80s children’s sci-fi, Bastion’s all about positioning and has none of the tools his friends do to help him. A controllable, high-powered, well-defended sentry in a good spot is invaluable, but getting caught changing isn’t any better for Bastion than it was for you that one time in the toilets. The self-repair is the strongest of its type in the game, but can’t be used while taking damage. Redesigned from a version that was more focused on camping single areas, Bastion does now have more options for interesting play by constantly reconfiguring, picking flanks and reacting well to oncoming threats. The pure damage output makes Bastion good for starting out, and in the early days before people understand just how strong it is with the gun pointed the right way you’ll get some free kills.
Get really good with: Widowmaker
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Primary: Widow’s Kiss – A fast-firing machine gun that’s deadly up to medium range. Secondary: Widow’s Sniper – Widowmaker aims down the site of her rifle, transforming it into a high-powered sniper weapon. Shift: Grappling Hook – Latches onto ledges and pulls Widowmaker up to them, allowing quick vertical traversal. E Ability: Venom Mine – Fires a mine that sticks to any surface and explodes on proximity to an enemy, poisoning them and anyone else nearby for a time. Ultimate: Infra-Sight – Gives Widowmaker, and her allies, the ability to see enemy heat-signatures through walls and other obstructions.
The quintessential sniper, Widowmaker’s other abilities rather let her do it all. She can protect her sniping spot – that she gets to more easily with Grappling Hook – via the Venom Mines, doesn’t suffer up close thanks to the power of an easily accessible sub-machine gun and her headshots charge quickly and kill off most characters in one. Just in case you were worried there wouldn’t be a team element in there, she’s got the global wall-hack. She’s countered by higher health and damage characters getting close, but still incredibly useful – if you can aim. Those who spend enough time with her and hone those skills really will be able to lock down entire areas, and don’t underestimate her power on the attacking side of a map, particularly for taking out enemy snipers and making things easier for your team.
Others:
Hanzo
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Primary: Storm Bow – Fires fast-moving arrows that are affected by gravity. Can be charged for more power. Shift: Sonic Arrow – An alternate fire mode that lodges the arrow in a wall and emits a pulse that marks nearby enemies, even those not in line of sight. E Ability: Scatter Arrow – This arrow fractures when it hits, ricocheting off surfaces and creating a death zone inside any small room. Ultimate: Dragonstrike – a charged shot that comes out as two massive dragon heads, passing through walls and enemies on its way. Deals heavy damage across its area of effect.
A very viable alternate to Widowmaker when it comes to maximising your impact once you’ve learned the ropes. Wall-climbing let’s you move about the map freely, and if you can hit heads you’ll do more damage faster than almost anyone else. Learning when to use your other abilities, particularly the room-clearing Scatter Arrow, will be vital, plus you can gather great intel with well-placed Sonics. While Hanzo can’t control an area quite as well as Widowmaker, he’s deadly be it spamming into a crowd or taking well-timed pot-shots. His ultimate will also combo as well as any in the game.
Mei
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Primary: Endothermic Blaster – A freeze beam that slows and eventually stuns a target if it can be continuously hit. Secondary: Endothermic Icicle – Heavy damage, slow firing projectile that has damage drop-off at long range. Shift: Cryo-Freeze – Stuns Mei and makes her immune to all damage inside an ice crystal that regenerates her to full health over 4 seconds. Can be cancelled early. E Ability: Ice Wall – Raises a large wall of ice at a target location, blocking vision, shots and movement for everyone. Ultimate: Blizzard – Throws Mei’s small robot ball friend to a location, who then constantly emits a freezing field with the same properties as her blaster.
Probably the most frustrating character in the game to go up against, Mei restricts movement and creates problems at every turn. Her Ice Wall is unique in its effect on the map, both letting you block off enemies and raise allies to positions they wouldn’t normally be able to reach. Particularly deadly for putting Bastion in unexpected positions. Blizzard, meanwhile, is one of few AoE ultimates where good reactions aren’t enough to stop it killing you, as the slow stops you leaving the field quickly and makes you an easy target for Mei and her buddies. Definitely another one with a lot of time required to master, but on a more strategic bent than purely to do with aim. Probably the oddest character in the game, it will likely be post-launch before her exact power level is determined – so get in early and start surprising people.
Torbjörn
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Primary: Rivet Gun – Long range bolts of fire that travel slowly and are effected by gravity. Secondary: Rivet Blast – A shot-gun varient on the above, spraying molten death in front of Torbjörn. Shift: Build Turret – Places an upgradable turret that puts out a high amount of damage and can be repaired. E Ability: Armor Pack – Throws out a collectable armor shard that can be picked up by team-mates, giving them some additional protection. Ultimate: Molten Core – A significant self-buff that gives Torbjörn faster attack and build speed, as well as making his turret more deadly.
There’s a lot of options in playing Torb, but the easiest way to do it is to embrace his Engineer stylings and camp one spot. However, you can go a support route too, creating safe zones with your turret and spending as much time as possible throwing out armour packs. Alternatively you can get aggressive, throwing up turrets regularly and using his decently-powered shotgun to hunt down enemies. His ultimate upgrades his turret into an OP killing machine, along with making him tanky as hell, and is custom made to receive a push and destroy it easily. Those of you who wants to play Torb likely already know it, but don’t pass him over out of hatred for that campy playstyle – you might find something you love in the little guy.
Overwatch Tank Heroes
Best tank hero to start with: Roadhog
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Primary: Scrap Gun – A short-range, wide-spread shotgun blast. Secondary: Scrap Gun Ball – Fires a ball that travels a short distance before releasing a shotgun blast in the direction it was fired. Shift: Chain Hook – Throws out a hook that latches onto opponents, dragging them towards Roadhog and dealing a bit of damage. E Ability: Take A Breather – Roadhog sucks on some gas for a short time, self-healing for half HP. Ultimate: Whole Hog – A stream of shrapnel fires constantly for a few seconds, knocking enemies back and doing damage.
A tank in all but fleshy hide, Roadhog is about getting up close and personal with opponents whether they like it or not. A massive HP pool and the ability to regenerate help him get there, but slow run speed and no tools for maneuverability mean careful positioning is required. His easy regen makes him a great starter as you’ll never die until you get into the thick of things. Planning routes between cover for a healing top-up or knowing back-routes to where poor snipers find their flanks exposed to hot shrapnel action is great, but he’s more than capable of going straight down the middle with good support. Probably has the most effective close-range weapon in the game, though doesn’t fire anywhere near as fast as Reaper. Plenty of room for growth with good hooks and ultimate timings too, and every so often you’ll knock a whole team off a point (or a ledge) for the big victory.
Alternately: Reinhardt
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Primary: Rocket Hammer – A wide-swinging melee attack that does heavy damage and knocks enemies back. Secondary: Shield – Projects a large barrier in front of Reinhardt that moves with him and takes a lot of damage to break. Allies can hide behind it for cover. Shift: Charge – Reinhardt powers forward in a straight line, grabbing enemies he hits. If he hits a wall, they take extra damage and are usually killed. E Ability: Fire Strike – His only ranged attack, Reinhardt swings his hammer letting out a jet of fire that can hit multiple enemies in a row. Ultimate: Earthshatter – Hitting the ground with the hammer, a wave of force is let out that knocks down and damages all enemies in a cone.
The tankiest of all the tanks, Reinhardt’s massive shield is certainly powerful and his movement options are surprisingly good. He’s got less range than his friends and a lower pure damage output rate, but Charge’s capacity to one-shot and the shield’s pure invulnerability shouldn’t be underestimated. He’ll fall quickly if he’s picked out, but once he’s in close there’s not a lot opponents can do about multiple hammer shots to the head. While you won’t be having as much obvious impact or be as independant while playing Reinhardt versus Roadhog or others, he’s one of the absolute best for teamplay, and completely changes the structure of a match as soon as he enters the field for either side.
Get really good with: Zarya
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Primary: Particle Cannon – A constant beam of energy with medium range, law damage but a good option. Secondary: Particle Grenade – A long-range, arcing ball of energy that explodes on impact. Shift: Particle Barrier – Places a shield around Zarya that absorbs a decent amount of damage before dissipating, each bit of absorbed damage powering up her main weapon. E Ability: Projected Barrier – Puts the barrier on a targeted ally. Ultimate: Graviton Surge – A powerful grenade that drags in all enemies around it for a few seconds upon detonation.
Zarya can do it all: she supports her team-mates, soaks up damage with half her HP being regenerating shields and deals out serious punishment once she’s charged up. Her particle beam will never be an all-star, but the grenade right-clicks are seriously punishing. Her ultimate is one of the most powerful in the game when timed right, and the perfect example of something that can be played around or countered, but still effective in the hands of an expert. Her barriers only last for a short time, so it’s key to make sure they’re put on targets that are already under fire. You need to have constant knowledge of your surroundings, likely attack routes and enemy status to use her properly, and timing her ult right is the difference between an easy team-wipe and stragglers getting away.
Others:
D.Va
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Primary: Fusion Cannons – Close-range rotary shotguns that never need to be reloaded. Primary (Human Form): Light Gun – Fast firing and reasonably damaging pistol with long-range. Shift: Boosters – Allows D.Va’s mech to move at increased speed and fly for a couple of seconds. E Ability: Defense Matrix – A cancellable projected cone that destroys all projectiles that enter it, including ultimates. Ultimate: Self-Destruct – Detonates D.Va’s mech, putting her into human form. Explodes after a long, obvious wind-up but does incredible damage.
Ultimate (Human Form): Call Mech – Drops a mech in front of D.Va which she climbs inside. The calldown does light damage and push back.
The best character design is this whole silly game. A future e-sports professional and small Korean girl riding a large bubblegum-pink mech, she’s very difficult to take down as she ejects for a bonus life whenever the mech is destroyed, giving her a powerful long-range weapon to help charge her quick-building ultimate and get back to full power. While in mech-form, the jets let her reposition and kill snipers or camping turrets easily. An incredible amount of fun and a massive nuisance for enemies, the only thing lacking is slightly lower damage than average, solved by good aim for critical hits. Good at taking a punch, she’s less impressive for supporting her team, usually operating as a slower, harder-hitting Tracer who can jet through shortcuts and behind defensive lines and prove a massive nuisance as a skirmisher. Do remember to tap her defense matrix on to any ult that uses projectiles or bullets – it’s a team-saver.
Winston
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Primary: Tesla Cannon – A short-range, conal attack in front of Winston. Shift: Jump Pack – Leaping into the air, Winston can reposition to higher surfaces. Also damages and staggers all enemies near the impact point. E Ability: Shield Projector – Throws out a device that extends a large protective bubble around an area. Team mates can shoot through it. Ultimate: Primal Rage – Increases Winston’s melee attack speed and damage, as well as buffing his damage resistance and health. Even gives Jump Pack a shorter cooldown while active.
A very tanky hyper intelligent gorilla, Winston’s good at getting into the fight. He’s focused on close-range combat though, so making sure he’s got support is important. The ult does make him very hard to take down, but also paints a big, red, angry target on him. If someone isn’t following up on your assault, you’ll take a couple with you but likely be mostly ineffectual. The Shield Projector is an all-star and very good against snipers and anyone unwilling to get in there with you, though doesn’t have the capacity to block ultimates for long. A good alternate to Reinhardt if you prefer to be more active, but the bubble shield is harder to use properly and provides protection for less time.
Overwatch Support Heroes
Best support hero to start with: Mercy
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Primary: Caduceus Staff – A healing weapon that fires a constant beam of regeneration at an ally. Secondary: Caduceus Damage – Utilising the same staff, this boosts the damage of an ally rather than healing them. Shift: Guardian Angel – Flies towards a targeted ally at great speed. Ultimate: Resurrect – Brings all nearby dead allies back to life at full health.
Medic was a ludicrously underplayed class in TF2, despite having power, fun and tactics behind it. Mercy has all that but with more options on what to do, more movement capabilities and an even more overpowered ultimate. Not mentioned above is a pistol she can swap to for some solo-damage, and it’s very underused by the majority of players. Her ultimate requires absolutely perfect placement to get the most out of, but it’s absolutely game-changing when it’s used right. If you want to be useful to your team, provide both pushing power and defensive buffs, you can’t go wrong with Mercy. Also benefits from not requiring any aim, or really much shooting at all, to be effective, instead being about keeping as many of your allies healed as possible, switching to damage output at key moments and positioning yourself for game-saving ults. Plenty to master, but simple enough that she makes a great first hero for learning maps and abilities.
Alternately: Symmetra
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Primary: Photon Projector – A beam of energy that will latch onto a target, damaging them until they leave its range. Secondary: Photon Ball – A charged ball that deals big damage as it travels and passes through enemies plus projected barriers. Shift: Sentry Turret – Places an immobile turret that lasers any enemies that come within range. Can place multiples. E Ability: Photon Shield – Gives an ally 50 HP of shields that only dissipate when they die, regenerating otherwise. Ultimate: Teleporter – Symmetra places a teleporter exit connected to an auto-built entrance at her team’s spawnpoint.
There’s a lot of ideas all wrapped up as one in Symmetra and they gel very well to make her a great support character. She’s got good damage with the Photon Ball charged attack and fantastic area denial with her turrets. Her healing/damage prevention ability is below the par of others you’ll see here, but all her tools keep her valuable, and she’s a perfect second-support, great for games where you’re not sure what you should be playing. It’s very possible that her teleporter alone is enough to make her useful in a game and everything else is sometimes icing. Keep shields on allies, always be charging a right click to send into a doorway or other chokepoint, and don’t be afraid to get aggressive once your teleporter is up.
Get really good with: Lúcio
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Primary: Sonic Amplifier – A three round burst of energy shots. Secondary: Soundwave – A conal blast that knocks all enemies in front of Lúcio back. Shift: Crossfade – Toggles between two buff auras around Lúcio, one granting movement speed and the other for healing. E Ability: Amp It Up – Increases the power of the currently active aura for a short time. Ultimate: Sound Barrier – Gives Lúcio and everyone around him a powerful shield that dissipates quickly.
Playing the support role in every way possible, Lúcio keeps his team up and active as long as he’s around. With friends around him he gives them an extraordinarily large amount of effective HP and can help to reposition quickly or chase down enemies. This also means you can’t chip away at a Lúcio-empowered team, as he’ll be constantly keeping them alive and he himself is challenging to kill despite a small health pool. He’s able to move around the map a lot easier with a Titanfall-style wall run, and that’s where your mastery comes into play. This helps him catch up with team-mates, get in position for big plays, sneak behind enemy lines to knock stragglers off the map with Soundwave or do surprising damage with headshots. Many a highlight reel features the Overwatch ‘boop’ – sending most or all of a team flying off a ledge – or Lúcio surviving a similar fate with clever, repeated wall-runs.
Others:
Zenyatta
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Primary: Orb of Destruction – Rapid firing projectiles from Zenyatta’s necklace. Secondary: Charged Orbs – Gathering all his orbs around him, Zenyatta projects five of them out at once for big damage. Shift: Orb of Harmony – An orb attachs to a nearby ally and continues to heal them for as long as Zenyatta is alive and they are within line-of-sight. E Ability: Orb of Discord – Attaches to an enemy, increasing the amount of damage they take from all sources so long as they remain within line-of-sight. Ultimate: Transcendence – Transforms Zenyatta into a healing beacon, making him immune to damage but unable to use other abilities until it finishes. He also constantly heals himself and those around him.
Floating Robot Death Monk wasn’t something I’d considered as a possible playable character in a video game before, but here we are. Zenyatta has a good mix of support and offensive abilities, and his ultimate is up there with Mercy for pure staying power of a team. His basic attacks have great range, perfect accuracy and do very good damage, making him a threat on his own, particularly with Orb of Discord. Orb of Harmony on a tank will make them nearly unkillable and he’s a great attacking support thanks to high move speed, but having to keep allies and enemies within line of sight can be a challenge on his small health pool. Occupying an offense/support middle-ground, if your team needs a healer but you can’t drag yourself away from those elimination numbers, he might be the robo-boy for you.
That’s our recommendations. Who do you like and why? Tell us in the comments, and leave tips for your fellow players to help them be effective allies (and worthy enemies). We’ll keep this guide updated through the game’s lifespan, with new heroes, new tactics and any patches that shake things up.
The teenager who grabbed headlines earlier this week for hacking a fake game listing on to Valve’s Steam store says there are “definitely” more vulnerabilities to be found in the popular game distribution service. But he won’t be the one to find them, thanks to what he sees as Valve “giv[ing] so little of a shit about people’s [security] findings.”Ruby Nealon, a 16-year-old university student from England, says that probing various corporate servers for vulnerabilities has been a hobby of his since the age of 11. His efforts came to the attention of Valve (and the wider world) after an HTML-based hack let him post a game called “Watch paint dry” on Steam without Valve’s approval over the weekend.
Once that exploit was fixed and publicized, Nealon quickly discovered a second Steam exploit, which Valve has since fixed. This one took advantage of a cross-site scripting hole to hijack a Steam admin’s authentication cookie through Valve’s own administrative Steam Depot page. Before it was reported and patched, this exploit could have given attackers unprecedented control of Steam’s backend, basically letting them pretend to be a Valve administrator.
Nealon tells Ars he was inspired to look into Steam simply because he had special access through a Steamworks account (acquired, apparently, though another now-fixed exploit). Looking back on those hacking efforts, Nealon said he was surprised at how easy it was to find such big holes in the underbelly of a major digital business.
“It looks like their website hasn’t been updated for years,” Nealon told Ars. “Compared to even other smaller Web startups, they’re really lacking. This stuff was like the lowest of the lowest hanging fruit.”
“I felt like Valve were exploiting me”
After publicizing two major holes in Steam in less than a week, though, Nealon says he’s retiring from Steam platform hacking due primarily to a lack of recognition.
Simply getting Valve to pay attention to his findings was an uphill battle in the first place; Nealon writes that the “Watch paint dry” exploit was “something I’ve been trying to report to Valve for the past few months,” but it wasn’t fixed until after he publicly demonstrated its viability this weekend. And while Valve’s security page gives public credit to a few “Hall of Fame” contributors that have found security vulnerabilities in the past, Nealon says he was discouraged to be told that listing is for “regular contributors only.”
Nealon says he’s also frustrated that Valve doesn’t have any sort of “bug bounty” program to reward users that find and report such issues. Companies like Google and Facebook would offer hundreds to thousands of dollars to someone who alerted them to problems like the ones Nealon exposed at Valve.
“I won’t be finding bugs anymore for Valve because there are plenty of companies that appreciate the time and effort put in by security researchers,” Nealon said. “See HackerOne, which is an entire platform hundreds of companies use. I felt like Valve were exploiting me.”
“I don’t want to sound like I’m bitching for free shit, but if this was Google or something with a similar majority of vulnerability here, Google would pay out,” Nealon told Kotaku earlier this week. “But Valve haven’t offered me anything. I’m not pissed off, but I’m a little bit disappointed, given that it’s a company of Valve’s size.”
Nealon isn’t the first one to look for more proactive security procedures from Valve. In 2014, some prominent members of the Steam developer community wrote an open letter urging Valve to set up a bug bounty program to encourage the discovery of more security holes. While Valve did formalize its bug reporting process somewhat in response to that request, the company said that “we don’t plan on establishing any formal bug bounty programs for any of our products at this time.” (A Valve representative was not immediately available to respond to a request for comment on this story).
Steam has been the subject of plenty of security and data privacy breaches in the recent past. In 2011, Steam’s forums were hacked shortly before a wider data breach that may have exposed users’ personal information, along with encrypted passwords and credit card data. In 2012, security researchers at ReVuln detailed an attack that could let hackers potentially insert malicious code onto a PC through Steam’s browser protocol.In 2013, Ars discovered a simple method to reveal personal information about Steam accounts that had been set to “private,” leading Valve to patch the hole. More recently, Steam has seen account takeover exploits and DDoS caching issues that revealed personal user pages to strangers.
Besides implementing a bug bounty program, Nealon suggested that Valve should “hire a dedicated application security team to support their developers in writing secure code and audit existing code to look for vulnerabilities (if they don’t have one already).” If the company doesn’t, he predicted more security problems on the horizon.
“I think there are definitely still vulnerabilities out there, and after recent events, people will probably be looking extra hard for them,” he said. “I think people should report something if they find anything, but I will personally not be devoting any more time to a company that seems to give so little of a shit about people’s findings… After all, this has happened and they still don’t give a shit.”
It is too easy, it isn’t fun, chances are you will lose money, you will meet trolls, you will meet lousy players, you will get frustrated. All for playing the same things over and over again. If I wanted items to come at random, I would buy crates and keys. At least I don’t have to play 2-3 hours of some boring, overplayed game before getting the drops.
MvM has a lot of potential, but the lack of new content makes it ridiculously easy and boring – and Valve doesn’t even try to release new challenges. Instead of creating expert (or harder) missions, we are back to Advanced with 2 Cities and Mecha, and that’s how it looks like things will be from now on (when we get 1 update every 1 year or so).
Nowadays, the metagame is all about finishing missions quickly, which makes everything even more boring. Build ubercharge on the sentrybuster? Check. Give all the crits to the demo? Check. Giants instantly destroyed by demo or spy? Check. Tank and crap bots are too easy, making everyone else’s job really irrelevant and boring? Check check check.
I really miss the time where most of my team had no idea what to do and neither did I. That was when MvM was new and fun. I have no idea what it is now – it can hardly be called a game, and it is certainly not entertaining.
The worst part is: MvM will never have a chance of renewing itself with community made maps, because people only play it for aussies. So even if someone creates a fun, different, amazing new map, no one will play it unless Valve adds it to the official servers and puts some kind of item reward alongside a mission. And, since Valve never does that and very rarely releases new maps themselves, well, MvM will hardly ever become fun & challenging again.
Image Source: Hello Games
