 "Top reviews this week: HTC One mini, Assassin's Creed 4, Instagram for Windows Phone and more!")
We’ve had yet another busy week, and this time, we’ve got five reviews for you. In case you missed them, we took a look at the HTC One mini, the Instagram app on Windows Phone 8, the ASUS Maximus VI Impact, Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag and Call of Duty: Ghosts. Check it out:
Instagram for Windows Phone review (5/10)
All in all, while the app looks beautiful and is smooth it has its chinks and it has major features missing. The fact that the camera button takes you to the gallery – which takes a really long time to load if you have a tonne of images – and then to an external camera is something that Instagram should be looking at closely to change. Video shooting capabilities won’t hurt either. You wouldn’t want to delete 6tag from your phones just yet.
Not the best photo-filter app on the operating system
ASUS Maximus VI Impact Review (7.5/10)
Go for this board only if you are looking for a feature-rich board for building a small form factor gaming machine. Another option you can consider, if you plan to have a multi-GPU setup is the ASUS Maximus VI Gene which is a microATX form factor board with the ROG branding coming for around Rs 17,100. If gaming isn’t your prerogative, but you want to get a more basic Z87 mini ITX board, then you can check out ASRock Z87E ITX which comes for around Rs 13,000.
Quite good if you want to build a tiny gaming PC
Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag Review (7.5/10)
Overall, Black Flag is easily the most enjoyable Assassin’s Creed title so far. While the game is still far from being perfect, it brings a delightfully refreshing look at a franchise that has in the past been offering almost the same kind of gaming experience. Apart from the slightly repetitive combat, there doesn’t seem to be much you can fault in the game. Stealth has improved, the side-missions have become more fun, the serious overtones have been dampened and the back drop of the Caribbean is gorgeous to look at. If you’re in the mood for a good game from a solid franchise, Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag is definitely a recommendation we can give.
Also, pirates!
HTC One mini Review (6.5/10)
HTC’s official retail price is Rs 36,790 but you can find it online for as low as Rs 33,000. Considering you can get much more powerful handsets for cheaper, the One mini is highly overpriced. In fact, the entire One series is overpriced and we can’t figure out why. If you love this sort of form factor, then we recommend you take a look at the Samsung Galaxy S4 mini. It’s almost Rs 10,000 cheaper, is lighter, has more RAM and support for microSD card up to 64GB, a faster CPU (1.7GHz), a bigger battery and has IR. The S4 mini is no competition to the One mini in terms of build quality and design, but then again, we find paying so much more for an aluminium shell a bit absurd. If the One mini drops to Rs 25,000, we whole heatedly recommend it but anything beyond that is paying too much. If you are shopping in the Rs 30,000 segment then look no further than the Google Nexus 5 which just went on sale today.
With a price tag makes us question the ‘mini’ moniker
Call of Duty: Ghosts Review (5/10)
Ghosts lacks a lot of the great features we saw in Black Ops 2, such as the ability to stream to Twitch from right out of the game. Overall, except for the modified Pick 10 system and multiplayer maps, it seems like a giant step back for the franchise, especially after the awesomeness of Black Ops 2—both in single player and multiplayer. To that end, our verdict sits at buy either Black Ops 2 or Battlefield 4 (despite us giving it a less-than-favourable review) instead of Ghosts. The story isn’t very good and the multiplayer is more-or-less the same, barring the more epic Battlefield 4 multiplayer. Despite boasting high production values, the game needs an unnecessarily beefy rig to play it, an unjustifiably large download, and overall does nothing to justify its hefty Rs 3,899 price tag.
Oh yeah! Definitely next-gen!
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