Review the last game you played (non-spam version) [Archive]

GolemsVoice

2013-06-22, 05:33 PM

Currently Playing: Planetside 2

For a shooter MMO that fully enables friendly fire, it has a surprisingly small amount of jerks and the usual language. That alone is an immense point in favour of the game.
The game itself can range from fascinating to frustrating, with often only a few minutes between those moments. Cresting a small hill as a footsoldier, while before you rumble tank columns and aircraft reign fire on the defenders feels epic. It doesn't feel like you're the one soldier who can change the course of the war, it feels like you're really part of a team, and have to work as a team to win. Alone you're fragile, a few hits and you'll go down, and if you see aircraft or tanks, you won't achieve much unless you happen to be the right class carrying the right weapons.
On the other hand, being stuck with people that can't work as a team to literally save their lives, being gunned down by three aircraft the moment you step out of your spawn zone, and knowing that even with a rocket launcher, you won't achieve much, is frustrating as hell.
I don't mind the fact that if you want to buy most weapons, you either have to play a LOT and very successfully, or you have to buy them with real money. Weapons DO make a difference, but it's not as big as in other games.

All in all I'd say between 6/10 and 8/10, but in general 8/10.

Played:

Metro: Last Light
The basic premise: the world has perished in nuclear fire, and only a few people have survived by hiding in the eponymous Moscow Metro, where they now eek out an excistence among the ghosts of the dead, radiation and mutants.
Metro: Last Light is very much a shooter, and it never pretends not to be. The hero doesn't speak a single word (during the games, he is quite talkative in his diary, though), there are no quests, and no big choices. But few games manage to showcase misery and hope in such close proximity. A small child asks her dad, who is catching fishes if he is sure that they won't catch "crabs" (a sad double meaning, the Russian word "rak" means both "crab" and "cancer"), like the ones who killed mother. The man answers that, no, they have a radiation detector now.
Metro: LL, much like the first part, focusses on the small things. Daily misery brought by the conditions, but, more importantly, perpetuated on man, by man himself. The metro is populated by people who enact violence on others (the Fascists, the Reds, the normal bandits) and victims of that violence, who either have to suffer it, or have to arm themselves just to survive.
Atmosphere is one of Metro's strongest points. The environment ranges from ramshackled housings in old stations to the claustrophobic eternal night of the tunnels to the radiated wasteland of post-war surface Moscow, all rendered in loving detail that any visitor who is familiar with both the Metro and Russian utilitarian architecture will instantly recognize. Your flashlight illuminates only a small part of the endless darkness, and if you have to put on a gasmask, moisture collects and your breath get's ever more laboured the more your filter ages.
The game itself is a solid shooter, with a focus on preserving ammunition and gear. This, however, is less prominent on lower difficulty levels, where you can play it more or less as a straight shooter. A thing that I found fascinating is the fact that you hardly ever have to KILL anyone if you don't want to. Most people can be knocked out if you sneak up on them, and sometimes, even the normally feral and aggressive mutants can be left alone.

Small criticism: the non-Russian voice-acting. A lot of the atmosphere stems from background dialogue, and the use of typical slang and manners of speaking of the different Russian social and ethnic groups. These will be instantly familiar to any Russian, but are, of course, lost in translation, where people get a Russian accent for no apparent reason (they're all speaking Russian, obviously). The important dialogue is subtitled, and you can choose subtitles seperatly from the spoken language, so I chose Russian for spoken and English for written, since my Russian is ok. Most people won't have this option, and either miss out on dialogue by choosing Russian, or miss out on atmosphere by choosing English.
Also, the games ultra-hardcore mode, Ranger Mode Hardcore, has no interface. While this is nice in theory, what the developers did was just to REMOVE any interface. That include prompts for pressing buttons during Quicktime Events, an interface where you can choose your thrown weapon and change the ammunition, and a counter for ammunition. If you want to change your thrown weapons, you now have to bring up the menu (which will be THERE, but you won't SEE it) and then flail around with the mouse until you hear the sound of the weapon you want. Also, no visual, in-game ways for, for example, checking current or general ammunition has been implemented. Which is kinda important, because military-grade bullets are currency in LL, and you can end up accidentially shooting money at your enemies.

So all in all, a really great game with minor flaws: 9/10

EDIT: another thing I forgot to mention: the game has a morality meter, even though it's invisible, and two endings. However, morality isn't chosen by a few major light side/dark side choices, but rather over the course of the game by minor, everyday acts you do or don't, such as completing an area without killing anybody, listening to conversations, not taking money from beggars, etc. There are of course obvious ones, too, like stopping a rape, but mostly they're little things that gather.

Also, the fact that I more or less started playing it again immediately after I finished it the first time says something!

Dumbledore lives

2013-06-22, 05:55 PM

Soul Calibur V

Soul Calibur most recently has been a series with a good fighting engine and relatively pretty graphics, but an awful story/single player mode. This has not changed at all in V. There is a story mode focusing on a couple of the new characters which is written in an adequate way with maybe five cutscenes of various qualities and about twenty battles. That is the only thing resembling a story, with just arcade more for the other single player modes. This is very disappointing, I mean Soul Calibur IV had an ending for each character at least and the Tower of Lost Souls which took quite a while to get through and had some interesting variations on normal fights.

With that said from what I've seen the netcode is very good and the fighting engine on the whole is improved with decent enough balance that any character can do well, though a few could definitely use a nerf, though they will never get it because the only DLC was stuff for the character creator. Now the creator is actually the main reason I got the game and it delivers well allowing effectively infinite combinations with a good variety in parts and options. Overall though I'd say if you're not a big Soul Calibur fan it's not worth it, because there really isn't that much to the game.

7/10 (PS, scores are stupid.)

Admiral Squish

2013-06-22, 08:03 PM

Currently Playing:
Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath (Xbox, the original)
Review: This is a great game. Now, I'm not usually the kind of guy who plays stealthy, sneaky, finessed sorts of characters. I'm more of a brute-force kind of guy, generally. But in this game, stealth is fun! It's rewarding. You have different kinds of enemies that need to be handled differently, some of which it's highly inadvisable to try and take straight-on. You have different kinds of live ammo that reward mastery in different ways, some of which are only usable while being sneaky. But you're not powerless either, the game has a tolerance for players who prefer the brute force method, at least in limited doses. The shake it off health mechanism encourages you to be aware of your surroundings and find cover so you can heal up between bouts of combat. It's still got the fast-paced heart of a shooter, but it's weapons and mechanics encourage tactics and strategy you don't see in most shooters. It's a really great game, honestly.
For the first half.
I'm not going to reveal the big twist here (though the statute of limitations is likely expired for such spoilers), but there's a big change around 2/3 through the game. After that, the game plays very different. The emphasis on stealth falls away, and you're thrust into large-scale battles. You're left playing a plain shooter, and the mechanics that earlier made it a marvelous stealth-shooter, leave you with a character that's sub-par for such large scale encounters. It's still fun, but it's less... unique, all of a sudden.
Rating: 9/10 for the first part, 6/10 for the second.

Last game played:
Sid Meier's Pirates. (PC)
Review: Overall, it's a very fun, simple game. You play as a pirate captain in the Caribbean somewhere between 1600 and 1700, you can choose the exact era. You sail around, engaging in ship battles, sword fights, treasure hunting, governess seducing, family-rescuing, and revenge-seeking. You recruit crew, buy and sell supplies and goods, purchase special upgrades for your ship, or yourself. It's easy to learn, it's great fun, and it's hard to master, I still haven't managed to rescue my entire family yet.
Rating: 9/10

Zevox

2013-06-22, 08:16 PM

Recently played: Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus
7/10 - A straightforward, enjoyable platformer. I really liked the "Saturday morning cartoon" style of it, as well as simply playing such a platformer that isn't Mario or Sonic again for the first time in ages. It's no Mario 64 or Banjo-Kazooie, but it's a solid game. Would play again.

Currently playing: Sly 2: Band of Thieves
Pretty much the same as the first, in overall assessment if not particulars. It trades the numerous individual levels per episode of the first game for moderately larger hub areas that have half the action occur in them, which is a change I'm ambivalent about. It puts more of a focus on making each mission part of how Sly would operate as a thief, starting each episode with reconnaissance, then moving into preparation and setup, then finally ending on the big heist once all is in place. This is good for the game thematically, since well, Sly is supposed to be a thief, but I do personally find it loses a little of the simple charm of its more straightforward predecessor. It also lets you play as Sly's cohorts, Bentley and Murray, but I find I prefer just playing Sly himself.

Currently playing: Scrolls.
7/10, with room to grow. It's basically a video game TCG, and it's pretty enjoyable as such. It could use more cards in each faction, and more factions, but it will get those over time, since it actually just went into open beta recently anyway. There's also some balance concerns, but nothing too bad, especially for a game technically still in its beta phase. Glad this forum brought it to my attention, as I doubt I'd have heard of it were it not for the thread about it here.

Grinner

2013-06-22, 09:14 PM

Last game played:
Sid Meier's Pirates. (PC)
Review: Overall, it's a very fun, simple game. You play as a pirate captain in the Caribbean somewhere between 1600 and 1700, you can choose the exact era. You sail around, engaging in ship battles, sword fights, treasure hunting, governess seducing, family-rescuing, and revenge-seeking. You recruit crew, buy and sell supplies and goods, purchase special upgrades for your ship, or yourself. It's easy to learn, it's great fun, and it's hard to master, I still haven't managed to rescue my entire family yet.
Rating: 9/10

Hey, I remember that one. Good times.

Forbiddenwar

2013-06-24, 11:46 AM

Currently Playing: Dungeon Defenders

Why do I keep buying and playing these Co-Op only Tower Defense games on Solo? Why don't they ever make Single Player Tower Defense? This game, however, does make it easier to solo that the last Co-Op only TD game I tried, Sanctum. Fun silly, Some grinding and playing on easy required if trying solo. Not as good as Orcs must Die, but quite fun nonetheless.

Hiro Protagonest

2013-06-24, 06:23 PM

NeoVid

2013-06-24, 07:40 PM

Currently Playing: Scribblenauts Unlimited

7/10- My first personal experience with the (brilliant) Scribblenauts concept seems to have been hurt a bit by the fact that this entry in the series is more open, with less focused puzzling elements. The core idea of Scribblenauts, solving puzzles by conjuring anything you can think of, is still genius, but Unlimited tends to have simpler solutions to its challenges than I was expecting. The game's sense of humor and potential for random insanity is as good as ever, but when solutions are simple, there's less motivation to try something crazy. Since I got the game on a 75% off sale, I don't regret what I spent. Also, I haven't completed the game yet, so I'll have to update this when I've seen the final levels.

Often Playing: Super Monday Night Combat

9/10- Combine League of Legends with Team Fortress 2 and make it funnier than both of them put together, and you've got SMNC. This is a free-to-play MOBA which is also a shooter, played as an arena-based bloodsport in an insanely funny dystopian future. Like a typical MOBA, the goal is for your team of 5 players to escort your team's AI allies down the lanes to destroy the enemy team's turrets and, eventually, main base. Like all MOBAs, there's far more to it than that. Team composition, character role, jungling, map awareness, timing and player skill all matter, so try not to get too distracted by the gut-bustingly entertaining commentary from the announcers and your character. The biggest problem with SMNC is the lack of player base. MOBAs and shooters are both skill-intensive genres, so it's hard to have fun if you're not good, and you will not be good when you start out. Fortunately, the small number of regular players also means SMNC may have the least toxic community out of the MOBA genre, since we're always glad to see someone new (to score kills on).

Jack Talk Thai

2013-06-24, 08:18 PM

I'll review the two I play most often lately, both relatively old games...

1. Phantasy Star Zero (DS Lite) I'm heavily into these 'loot finding' dungeon run games, and this is a prequel to an old fave from long ago, PSO on Dreamcast (my first foray into online gaming, unforgettable fun). You basically choose a class (Ranger, Magic User, Droid-types) and gain levels and gear as you fight your way through the areas and confront bosses and rare enemies (and rare areas). As in the original game the 'elite' rares you really want are insanely rare, but that 'you never know' factor keeps you coming back.

2. Sacred 2: Fallen Angel (PS3)Another loot-grind, this one is more Diablo-like, almost a mixture of Diablo and Elder Scrolls (in terms of size of the world). You can create a character and run through any of the many modes but I mostly go online and kill the (many) bosses with whoever joins my group. Fun abilities, massive bosses, tons of rare loot to farm. Feels good taking down a dragon or a giant squid with a group of guys, or alone even.

The Rose Dragon

2013-06-24, 09:02 PM

The Last of Us: A survival horror game in a world gone to hell with an infectious fungal outbreak that turns people insane (go Cordyceps), you play the role of Joel, a self-styled survivor, as he protects a 14-year old girl named Ellie on a journey across what is left of America.

The Good: You really get to bond with the characters, especially Ellie, whose optimism and determination can be as infectious as the fungus. There is almost always another way through enemies than the one you took. It really rewards creativity, resourcefulness and thorough scavenging if you want to survive. The scenery, especially in cities, is simply amazingly pretty to look at. Dealing with the infected can be really tense and scary, if you are into that sort of thing.

The Bad: The game is really linear, with no options to change the story except through premature death. Bloaters are really annoying to deal with, as they only accept bullets and fire as a way of bypassing them. Aiming can be very wonky. Dealing with the infected can be really tense and scary, if you aren't into that sort of thing.

The Ugly: Dying is really easy if you are careless. Survivor mode comes pre-scavenged, with few crafting supplies left where they are on lower difficulties. The switch to Survivor mode can be jarring if, like me, you are used to Listen Mode giving away enemy locations. The late game enemies have no sense of fairness, as they outnumber you, outgun you and they know it.

Final Verdict: If you have a PS3, you should probably at least rent this game to see what all the fuss is about. If you don't, you should get a friend that has one and nag him about buying it.

Score: 9/10.

Cespenar

2013-06-25, 12:58 AM

Thomas Was Alone: A simplistic platformer in mechanics, it's really the narrator that makes the game. I think the guy's a British comedian in real life or something, though I don't know of him much. Anyway, you may think of it as the comedy equivalent of Bastion, in terms of narration quality. Apart from that, not much else. The gameplay is there to serve as a medium, and does what it's intended. Could have a better plot and ending, but overall, a fun game to play, or watch a (rather silent, hopefully) LP of.

7.75/10, I guess.

Alaris

2013-06-25, 01:47 AM

Final Fantasy 4 (SNES) & After Years (PSP): Yes, I finally got around to playing it. And I must say that it is simply BRILLIANT. The story is amazing, the gameplay on top of that is amazing... I loved the characters in the series. If you've never played it... and you own a PSP, get the Complete Collection. 9/10 easily.

Final Fantasy 9 (PSOne): I'm currently playing this... and it's rather awesome as well. If you hadn't guessed, I'm going through the Final Fantasy series... I've played several of them, but missed a few key ones. Thankfully, I have some friends who want me to get through them. So far... 8/10, but we'll see how it pans out. It's a very good RPG... but like most Final Fantasy games... time consuming.

Triaxx

2013-06-25, 03:42 PM

I think your score will go up. It's one of the best FF games I know of, and everything makes sense. Except for a surprise, but it wouldn't be a Final Fantasy without a surprise out of nowhere. Beats the life out of FF8 for story.

Squark

2013-06-25, 06:09 PM

Last Played: Mass Effect 3. Overall Score: 7/10. Gameplay is solid, and between additional foreshadowing from the Leviathan DLC and the Extended Cut, the ending is satisfactory. Multiplayer is fun, if a bit of a grindfest. The score would be higher if I didn't feel that 2 DLCs (One of which is free, but still) were required to make the ending tolerable.

Currently Playing: Dragon Age: Origins (Ultimate Edition). Overall Score: 8/10. Interesting characters and individual questlines. Plays similarly to older Bioware RPGS, mechanically. One complaint I do have is the lack of tension regarding the "imminent invasion;" I can run around freely doing sidequests and generally wasting time without feeling like I'm letting anyone down. I think, however, this is something Bioware learned from, as ME3 succeeds in creating a feeling of tension regarding the ongoing invasion (except during the Citadel DLC, but that was a lighthearted send-off to the Trilogy). This might not work so well in a less linear game, though.

(Just a personal scale, for reference;

10/10: This game is a work of art, and nearly flawless.
9/10: An excellent game, with only a few minor flaws.
8/10: Solid game, but not without it's week spots
7/10: Respectable game, or otherwise strong game with a few glaring issues.
6/10: Average Game; I don't regret playing the game, but am for the most part apathetic to it.
5/10: Disappointing Game
<5: Bad game
1/10: Game is unplayable/deeply offensive/otherwise horrible
<6:

Zevox

2013-06-26, 11:31 PM

Just finished: Sly 2: Band of Thieves.

My opinion of this one has improved over playing the entirety of it. While I do like the simple charm of the first Sly game, I can see how this one was good for the series. Changing the focus from normal platformer levels to missions based around actual thief work which eventually lead up to the heist at the end of each episode, along with the shift to larger hub areas and smaller indoor ones, gives the series a stronger and more unique identity I feel, while still preserving the strengths of the original. Surprisingly, it actually made stealthy gameplay work well with platforming gameplay, and managed to make many more of the new moves you could acquire throughout the game worthwhile than the first game did.

The writing also improved. I genuinely laughed at a few points, and by the end I felt like I had a much better sense of the characters other than Sly himself than I did at the end of the first game (and to an extent even Sly as well). And of course, it always still had that Saturday morning cartoon charm to it.

Final verdict from me: 8/10

I won't be starting Sly 3 immediately, however. Something else (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qT6hrd6lH0o) just came out that I'm rather eager to play first. :smallbiggrin:

(What my personal scale for such scores would be):
10: One of the best games I've ever played. This does not mean it's perfect - no game is - but the flaws are so heavily outweighed by the strengths that I hardly care about them. Example: Persona 3 and 4.
9: A great game, likely to come up in discussions of personal favorites. Usually has few flaws, and in the rare event it has big ones, they're overshadowed by the strengths. Example: Mass Effect 2 and 3.
8: A strong game, perhaps not enough so to be considered a personal favorite, but with strengths enough to make up for its weaknesses. Example: Batman: Arkham City.
7: A typical "good" game, of the sort I don't regret buying, but probably won't be calling a favorite any time soon. Usually has readily noticeable flaws, but is still pretty enjoyable despite them. Example: Mass Effect 1.
6: An above-average game, but flawed enough that I might regret buying it at or near full price. At this point I probably enjoyed it little enough that I can't quite call myself a fan of the series, unless future entries improve it. Example: Assassin's Creed.
5: An average game, which doesn't leave much of an impression on me. Flawed, but not without it's strengths. If I bought it at more than half price, I probably regret it. Example: Fable.
1-4: Weak games of different degrees which I enjoyed little if at all, the ones I'd regret buying unless I got them very cheap (and even then, for the absolute worst). I'm careful enough about my purchases that anything that might end up in this range rarely slips through, though. Example: Final Fantasy 8 (3/10).

Cespenar

2013-06-27, 07:24 AM

(What my personal scale for such scores would be):
10: One of the best games I've ever played. This does not mean it's perfect - no game is - but the flaws are so heavily outweighed by the strengths that I hardly care about them. Example: Persona 3 and 4.
9: A great game, likely to come up in discussions of personal favorites. Usually has few flaws, and in the rare event it has big ones, they're overshadowed by the strengths. Example: Mass Effect 2 and 3.
8: A strong game, perhaps not enough so to be considered a personal favorite, but with strengths enough to make up for its weaknesses. Example: Batman: Arkham City.
7: A typical "good" game, of the sort I don't regret buying, but probably won't be calling a favorite any time soon. Usually has readily noticeable flaws, but is still pretty enjoyable despite them. Example: Mass Effect 1.
6: An above-average game, but flawed enough that I might regret buying it at or near full price. At this point I probably enjoyed it little enough that I can't quite call myself a fan of the series, unless future entries improve it. Example: Assassin's Creed.
5: An average game, which doesn't leave much of an impression on me. Flawed, but not without it's strengths. If I bought it at more than half price, I probably regret it. Example: Fable.
1-4: Weak games of different degrees which I enjoyed little if at all, the ones I'd regret buying unless I got them very cheap (and even then, for the absolute worst). I'm careful enough about my purchases that anything that might end up in this range rarely slips through, though. Example: Final Fantasy 8 (3/10).

If anything, congratulations for actually using the 1-10 band as it's intended. I mean it. For some reason, the recent norm takes 7-8 as the average enjoyable game.

Squark

2013-06-27, 08:27 AM

If anything, congratulations for actually using the 1-10 band as it's intended. I mean it. For some reason, the recent norm takes 7-8 as the average enjoyable game.

I used the American Grading Scale out of familiarity with it, if that's what you're wondering.

Nerd-o-rama

2013-06-27, 08:38 AM

Currently Playing: Jade Empire. I found it in my closet alright?

Anyway, it's certainly an interesting look into history as Bioware's first original IP and first console-focused action-RPG. It's definitely a bridge between KOTOR and Dragon Age/Mass Effect. It's also nothing really special compared to any of those three, but the aesthetics are gorgeous. When you get past the fact that they reused character models from KOTOR, I mean. The controls are awkward on the PC, but combat is exactly as deep and fluid as I would want from a wuxia game. I can't really comment on the difficulty other than fights vary between highly strategic and button-mashing with distressing regularity.

Overall I'd probably give it an 8/10 when it came out and a 7/10 now, thanks to it not aging well in comparison to Bioware's more blockbustery titles. And the fact that they keep making the same damn game, although at least this time they managed to give you Aang's backstory from The Last Airbender.

PS The morality system is implemented in an incredibly stupid fashion but everyone knew that already. I'm just sad for the lost potential.

Zevox

2013-06-27, 11:09 AM

If anything, congratulations for actually using the 1-10 band as it's intended. I mean it. For some reason, the recent norm takes 7-8 as the average enjoyable game.
That's not really recent, that's been the case for as long as game reviews have been around, at least to my knowledge. Always thought it was silly myself, as it gives you all those numbers below 7 that get used so rarely, and which people hardly bother to distinguish between, instead just thinking of them as a lump of scores which all mean "bad, avoid it," while also giving you fewer ways to distinguish between various degrees of good games.

Grinner

2013-06-27, 12:11 PM

If anything, congratulations for actually using the 1-10 band as it's intended. I mean it. For some reason, the recent norm takes 7-8 as the average enjoyable game.

But right there is the flaw in that logic. Not many people find a game they think they won't like, play it, end up hating it, and continue playing nonetheless. They don't think to themselves "Slitting my wrists would probably be more entertaining than this. Oh well. Maybe it gets better." They just stop playing.

Cespenar

2013-06-27, 11:54 PM

But right there is the flaw in that logic. Not many people find a game they think they won't like, play it, end up hating it, and continue playing nonetheless. They don't think to themselves "Slitting my wrists would probably be more entertaining than this. Oh well. Maybe it gets better." They just stop playing.

The point is not that people won't play anything they won't immensely enjoy. They do it very often, in fact, since trailers and such tend to deceive a lot. I'm talking about the band they use. Nowadays (or rather, for some time, as Zevox had put it), anything below 8 is considered a "don't buy". Which shouldn't be the norm. 5-6 should logically be the breaking point. What's the point of having a 1-10 band if no one ever uses between 2-6? And don't get me started on the people who gives 1 to stuff like Mass Effect 3 or Dragon Age 2.

Apart from that very last part, the blame mostly lies with the review sites, but they managed to skew most of the general opinion towards this "norm" as well, sadly.

warty goblin

2013-06-28, 12:52 PM

Weirdly I find my score sweetspot pretty much tops out at 8.5. Anything above that, and odds are I won't like it. Anything below a 6.something and it's probably actually horrible. But a mid-sevens game in a genre I like is usually a worthwhile investment. This is less true for action games, but when it comes to strategy, many of my all-time favorites don't review all that well.

Zevox

2013-06-30, 11:25 PM

Recently Finished: Deadpool

This is one I was looking forward to for quite a while, and in most respects, it doesn't disappoint. As the trailers had me convinced was the case, the writing is spot-on - Deadpool is all kinds of over-the-top and hilarious, with plenty of fourth-wall breaking. It's kinda like having a built-in snarky Let's Play commentary at times. Hell, the plot is barely there, but that's because Deadpool himself doesn't care about it, ignoring every opportunity he gets to learn what the villains are up to in favor of just doing whatever amuses him at the moment. Well worth playing just for that, really.

Gameplay-wise it's like a cross between a Devil May Cry-style action game, a third-person shooter, and a few elements from the Batman: Arkham games. Melee combat is very DMC, albeit not as developed as that series, and guns can be incorporated into combos, but work much better on their own than in a typical DMC-style game. In fact, some segments throughout the game are obviously built to play more like a shooter, as enemies with guns tend to hurt quite a lot if there's several of them shooting you at once, and there are points where you face a bunch of them in a largely open area. There's also counter-attacking in the same manner as Batman does in the Arkham games, and some stealth killing, though that's rare and at times seems a tad buggy. Oh, and you also get some thrown weapons which serve utility/AoE roles - a couple types of grenades, bear traps that are very useful against big enemies, and land mines that deal huge damage.

Most of this is very fun, though as you might imagine I personally am not a big fan of the shooter segments - especially because there's no real cover system, so you have to stand behind something at least as big as you to actually take cover, and the designers were not always generous with those. I do get annoyed that, bluntly, the guns are just much more powerful than the melee weapons once you upgrade them, with everything but the pistols tearing through enemies you'd need several combos to take out with even the mightiest melee weapon, the hammers. This only matters much on the highest difficulty, though.

Speaking of difficulty, it's actually a pretty challenging game at some points on normal, and pretty brutal at those same points on hard. Too much so on hard, honestly - the damage enemies can do, the rate at which they attack, and the accuracy of the gunmen in particular is making getting through the last stages on hard a hair-pulling experience for me. But besides that, I was very pleased with the level of challenge.

The main problem it has I'd say is the low amount of content. It's maybe an 8-10 hour main story mode, and the challenge maps that are the only other mode don't really give you anything to do that you don't get in that story mode.

In the end, I think it's a good game, but it's disappointing in that it clearly could have been a great one. Some more content and further refinement to the combat mechanics could have made this something that would rival the Arkham games for the title of "Best Superhero Video Game" for me, but unfortunately it falls pretty short of that in its current state. I'd hope for a sequel, but with the development team laid off after the game was completed, I kinda doubt one will come even if it does well. Which is perhaps the saddest part of all.

Final score for me: 7/10

MCerberus

2013-06-30, 11:46 PM

Fable 3

Long story short, I'm getting this game and two others at a later date for $1 due to a couple of Microsoft promotions merged together.

I guess the best way to describe this game is simple. You generally hit your one of three attack styles of choice at stuff until it dies. Shops only sell one thing each and only replenish their stock with that exact thing later. You walk up to people, hit A, and they're you're friend now. Character customization through upgrades is... pretty well nonexistent.

Which brings me to a realization: a lot of stuff is cut, seemingly meaninglessly from the previous game in the series. This situation cuts deeper than one would expect. There isn't even a minimap. Instead we get an extremely clumsy pause menu that will eat up a ton of your time.

The story is something that looks like it would go into an interesting direction, then just stumbles and falls. Oh, and the game economy puts you into a positive-reinforcement loop that makes gold meaningless. Don't even get me started on the AI.

Functional, but bland and soulless. The game gives no reason why it should have been made and is content to wallow in mediocrity. 5/10
(note: this is on a 'how it relates to other games' scale instead of an academic scale. Average is 5.5)

Zevox

2013-07-01, 12:04 AM

Functional, but bland and soulless. The game gives no reason why it should have been made and is content to wallow in mediocrity. 5/10
Sounds like what I'd have said about the first Fable game. And I hear 3 actually got worse than its two predecessors - which I can readily believe even just based on what I know of their attempt to actually replace the pause menu. That's one of the dumbest ideas for a video game mechanic I've ever heard, and I'm not surprised it did not go over well.

MCerberus

2013-07-01, 12:08 AM

Sounds like what I'd have said about the first Fable game. And I hear 3 actually got worse than its two predecessors - which I can readily believe even just based on what I know of their attempt to actually replace the pause menu. That's one of the dumbest ideas for a video game mechanic I've ever heard, and I'm not surprised it did not go over well.

The first two had a sort of Wabi-Sabi charm that appealed to individuals to different amounts. This one buffed a lot of that down into a smooth, homogenous surface devoid of anything but scuff marks from the buffing.

It's just lucky the game functions and doesn't go out of its way to insult its users (hai there, CoD). In other words, the bar was set low. Nobody cared that it made it over.

Mx.Silver

2013-07-01, 06:09 AM

Finished
Deus Ex 2: Invisible War.

At the risk of starting a flame war, this isn't as bad as it's portrayed. Yes, it's not quite as good as Deus Ex or Human Revolution; yes, losing the limb damage system is annoying and yes, the level maps just aren't quite big enough. Despite this, in strict terms, it's not actually a bad game. At all.
Despite the slightly cramped level design, it nonetheless manages to give a very large amount of options in dealing with your missions and accomplishing goals. Playing both sides is entirely possible (and indeed arguably your more optimal path), as is double and even-triple crossing various handlers, which makes feel more independent than JC ever did. This is reinforced by the game leaving the decision of who your handlers are up to you for most of the actual game. That pretty much all your decisions will have effects later on is again nice to see.
Although the story still isn't particularly good, it does do a much better job of actually involving the whole 'future of humanity' conflict than the first game (although admittedly saying that is almost damning with faint praise). It's still far from perfectly handled, but it does at least try to frame it more as an actual clash of plans and ideologies. It also adds a 'none of the above' ending option, which I felt was sorely lacking from the original. Of course, the eventual endings themselves are still fairly crap, but that's par for the course as far as this series is concerned really.
Mostly though, it's just fun to play. The augmentation options open up quite a lot of different styles, and nearly all of them are actually viable to some degree (even melee builds work reasonably well).

Krazzman

2013-07-01, 08:40 AM

I play games more "parrallel" in terms that I have time to play what I think amuses me the most at the time as such I have a few games finished and playing currently:

Orcs Must Die 2(finished, in my opinion):

All in all it made some cool upgrades to the first. But generally it get's tedious rather than more fun with enhanced traps.

Gameplaywise the traps feel weaker initially and even upgraded are rather "downgraded". The DLC's give more maps and new enemies but are in some cases just annoying. Bringing in complicated maps where enemies swarm you from two sides with nearly no money to hold the hordes off. (see Are we there yeti's second level). After playing everything in Warmage mode I needed "guides" or walkthroughs to beat these maps on apprentice level (even the final level). Which sucked quite some fun out of it and I for one would've liked it more when you could built killboxes and then don't need to care that much anymore.

Endless modes is a timejunk in this case as it doesn't bring anything new just more and more and more waves of enemies. The most annoying things are the new Gnolls.

I will still give it a 7/10 mainly because it was fun but a few aspects really spoiled the fun for me.

Star Wars the Force Unleashed(finished):
Yes the first part. Storywise and from the graphics this wasn't so bad. But the gameplay was tedious sometimes. Jumping for those bonusstuff/generally advancing through platforming sections/while fighting/forceusing etc. wasn't as good as in the PS2 version i played before. The fighting is... dragging itself in the later parts. Instead of Jedi-slaying action you fight people that are a real pain in the ass most of the times. The most effective tactic i had was: spam force lightning all the way. A few enemies weren't really melee able. Bossfights, even against jedi only became really good in the "cutscene" fighting.

5/10 because I just sat there cursing because of the jump parts.

Assassin's Creed Revelation (currently "playing"):
The Slave, Lady and fighter system isn't really what I like. It feels forced and not really good. You get next to no warnings when you will be attacked. Even if you run suddenly the guards hate you...

3/10 currently rather bad, maybe gets better after a few hours of play.

Silent Hill Book of Memories (currently playing):
More or less hack'n'slash. The first bossfight was a bit hard. Meleeing as a "good" tactic most of the time, suddenly shooting being far better. The general system of hitchance/blockchance etc isn't that. But the voiceacting is bad. Real bad. The Character customisation is cool but you only have some predefined clothings/hairstyles. I went for the Male Metalhead and I was missing a few specific clothings. A guy runing around with an bandshirt would've been nice.

7/10 so far as the system might not be transparent but is fun so far.

Cespenar

2013-07-01, 12:06 PM

Ebon_Drake

2013-07-01, 01:13 PM

Finished
Deus Ex 2: Invisible War.

<snip>

Agreed, I played it fairly recently and had very low expectations, so was pleasantly surprised. It isn't Deus Ex and it isn't perfect, but there are a number of good elements to it. If it's taken in isolation it's a decent FPS/stealth/RPG blend (leaning more heavily towards FPS than the original game), it just had a crushing weight of expectation on its shoulders.

My major criticism of it was the universal ammo system, since i often found myself running dangerously low on ammo even when just fighting small groups of enemies. However, I think that had more to do with it having a restrictively low maximum ammo limit rather than a problem with the universal ammo concept per se.

It's also worth pointing out that it's an absolute pig to run on PC. When it was released it had horrendously high system specs, and even now it's a pain to get working. I've tried to run it on 4 different PCs, all of which shouldn't have had any trouble, but only the newest has actually been able to run it.

Admiral Squish

2013-07-02, 12:12 PM

Last game played:
Hulk: Ultimate Destruction (Xbox, original flavor)

This game is so much fun. It's a little simplistic, honestly. The story mode feels kind of forced in some places, but I can forgive them that much, because their primary goal was obviously to make a fun, simple, and entertaining game where you get to play as the freakin' hulk. You are a walking engine of destruction. You get to pick up/throw/hit things with pretty much anything that's not nailed down or anything that can be easily broken off from it's moorings. Trees. Traffic lights. Cars. Telephone Boxes. Plus, there's the interesting weaponizations. You can pick up certain items and 'weaponize' them into tools for you to smash other things with. Cars become steel fists. Trucks and buses become shields. You can tear a missile truck apart and throw the missiles. You can take a tank and hammer-throw it into other things. You can ride a helicopter down to the ground. You bound through the city in great leaps, and you can run or climb any vertical surface. Generally speaking, it's immense fun.

Overall Rating: 9/10

Sharoth

2013-07-05, 12:21 PM

Borderlands 1 - Game of the Year Edition (On X-Box 360 and PC)

Borderlands 1 is a fun first person shooter game that does not take itself too serious. The four DLCs are also fun and make it worth picking up the GOTY Edition just for them. It can be played either in single player or with up to four people. I had been hesitant to buy this game when it came out, but about a year ago I found the stand alone game at a pawn shop for $10. SOLD!!! After playing it for a week and having a blast, I went out and bought the GOTY edition. The main storyline is fun, but not as touching as the Fallout series. The main reason why you play this game is for the mayhem, leveling up and optiminzing your character, and the loot. The developers have made it to where there is a near infinte variety of items. After a while, you are just waiting for the next weapon drop to see if it is better than the one you have. It does get a bit repedative after the third or forth time playing it, but you will forget that when you are fighting off a hoard of bandits or loot hunting.

Storyline 6.5 to 7 out of 10.
Gameplay 8.5 out of 10.
Humor Value 8.5 out of 10.
Loot quality 9.5 out of 10. :-)

Zevox

2013-07-11, 12:19 AM

Just finished: Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves

This one was kind of a surprise. Compared to Sly 2, it's actually shorter, and removes a couple of features - one that was present from the first game, clue bottles that you collect to unlock vaults holding new moves for you to learn, and one that 2 introduced, large treasures you could take back to your safe house for big money rewards. I honestly have no idea why those were removed, as I liked both of them. Heck, the clue bottles were my main reason for exploring every level thoroughly, and their absence made 3 feel even shorter than it otherwise would have as a result.

In exchange, it adds new characters who join the Cooper Gang... two of which get a much more limited array of abilities than the main gang, and the other two of which basically just get mini-games for their segments. And between the shorter length and larger number of characters (and one of them not speaking intelligibly...), it only really feels like one of them, Penelope, gets properly integrated into the cast.

And really, the game is much too heavy on mini-games in general for my taste - perhaps it's my imagination, but it felt like half of the missions either involved or were entirely mini-games. A few were actually good (the bi-plane segments and the pirate ship one mainly), but most I didn't particularly like.

Still, under all that, it has at its core the same gameplay that made Sly 2 fun, and of course the same cartoony charm to its writing that the first two had. And a couple of the levels were particularly good, especially the pirate one. And it does have the best final boss fight in the series that I've played so far, though still a flawed one. It definitely feels like a step back compared to Sly 2 though. I really hope that Sly 4 managed to improve on things at least back to 2's level - I currently have that one in the mail.

Final score for me: 7/10.

Admiral Squish

2013-08-14, 10:08 PM

I really like this thread, so I'm hoping to bring it back.

Lately, I've been playing a lot of my old computer games, so I'll do a bunch of reviews.

Demigod:
This is a really fun game. It's kinda like DoTA or LoL, with you controlling a demigod hero to fight other demigods, while waves of reinforcements and defensive towers operate automatically around you. Your hero levels up from 1-20, allowing you advance in a variety of different ability lines. Two of the same demigods may play very differently from one another, depending on your choices. There are ten demigods to choose from, five 'assassins' and five 'generals'. Assassins are solo, powerful characters that fight alone. Generals raise minions and can buy icons that allow them to summon more. There's single-player (skirmish and tournament) and multi-player modes. The game's obviously designed for multi-player, but my computer's terrible, so I do most all of my play in single player.

The game is absolutely beautiful. The characters, the structures, the reinforcements, they all have great designs and are extremely detailed, even when you zoom all the way in. They move realistically, it's very smooth. You can really get the feeling of these powerful being slugging it out. The stages are designed beautifully, too. There's one stage where you fight on a massive plateau of ice. And if you look at it just right, you can see the face of a colossal demon frozen deep below your feet. The announcer is a deep powerful voice that really sounds appropriate to the fight. There's not MUCH in the way of story, but the opening cinematic is amazing, and each demigod has a great backstory you can read at the selection page.

Final rating: 9/10. My only complaint is that the AIs are kinda dumb, and since I play single player all the time, it affects me more than most.

Firefall:
Also a fun game. This is a sci-fi MMO shooter. No levels, you level up by building more advanced pieces of gear out of resources you acquire, either by mining or completing missions. There aren't many 'quest lines' that you follow like in most MMOs, it's all sandbox. you roam through this world, picking up missions in the area and fighting wildlife. The setting's really cool, it's set in south america, but south america after hundreds of years of bio-engineering, ice ages, natural and unnatural catastrophes. What you end up with is this bubble of livable land protected from the ravages of this massive radiation/mutation storm called the Melding. Forests of coral, plains patrolled by herds of brontodons, great cliffs of stone with caves occupied by huge swarms of giant insectoids.

The game's fun, interesting, and has a cool system. Unfortunately, my computer can't handle it. It plays fine when I play alone, but whenever I team up with other guys it gets intolerably laggy.
Final rating: 7/10

Spore:
Always an awesome game. Create animals, create buildings, create empires, reshape planets. The ultimate sandbox. All in all, it's a lot of fun. You really have to work the get off the ground, but it's lots of fun once you get up there. You get advanced tactics.

Currently, I'm operating a sprawling galactic diplomatic empire. But I'm not against force. I do not tolerate bullies. Any society I encounter that attempts to extort money out of me gets the hammer dropped on 'em, and hard. I'm in a massive war with the grox at the moment, wiping them out one planet and establishing colonies all the way in toward the galactic core.
Final rating: 8/10

Neverwinter:
Another interesting game! A D&D-based MMORPG. The combat system is extremely interactive and fast-paced, not just 'stand still and hit buttons in sequence'. You move constantly, you throw up defenses as powerful attacks come down the line, you use encounter and 'daily' abilities as necessary. It's fun and active, and you can really get into the world of Neverwinter.
Final rating: 8/10

Kid Jake

2013-08-14, 10:26 PM

I had completely forgotten about Demigod. That was an awesome game. Reminded me of that game Unholy War from the PlayStation, only without a handy Killcycle to make everyone stop playing with me.

Forbiddenwar

2013-08-16, 10:36 AM

Terraria
Wow, this game has changed since it's 1.0 days. The introduction of Hardmode really makes this game feel complete. When I last played, in 1.0, the game felt half finished with the last boss guarding the entrance to the dungeon, there was no reason to explore the dungeon. At least for me, getting better loot was not a good enough reason for exploring the underworld or the dungeon or the floating islands. Now with more bosses to fight and a quest to achieved (purge the world of the spreading corruption) all that exploration has a purpose.

And, perhaps needless to say, Hardmode is HARD. Even with the best gear, you have to carefully plan your arena to fight a boss in and fight smarter than any other time in the game. Spamming arrows won't help you anymore!

If you put away terraria after 1.0 and hadn't looked at it since, now is the time to pick up your lasersaber and go to town.

Just watch out for those Werewolves, they're harder than they look.

Tebryn

2013-08-16, 07:03 PM

Recently and still Playing: Delvers Drop and Spelunky HD

Delver's Drop: DDrop as it's being called is a top down dungeon crawl that draws heavily on the difficulty of The Binding of Isaac, the amount of lore from any Bioware game and the artist draw of the old SNES Legend of Zelda and Secret of Mana. The game is only in Closed Alpha but it already gets an 8/10 from me and will easily shoot up to 10 when it's finished. It's only not there because...frankly...it's rather unpolished.

Spelunky: One of the main forces behind the Rogue-Like-Like genre blended with other gameplay styles, Spelunky HD is the remake of Spelunky on X-Box returned to PC and it doesn't hold it's punches. Easily one of the most addictive and fun games I've played with difficulty to compare. Spelunky HD is a platformer at first glance but it's more...it's got exploration and trials, puzzles and a bit of RPG thrown into the mix. It's hard to explain and even harder to master. Honest score? 9/10. The only detractor is that sometimes the game spins out of control with it's physics engine and...that can ruin our day. The Shop Keepers are also made of jerk.

Komodo

2013-08-18, 04:35 PM

Legend Of Grimrock: This game is a pity to review, as it was a game I really wanted to like. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The premise is thus: You create four characters, choosing among four different races and three classes, although your character's avatars do not actually appear in-game and are nothing more than static headshots. The four characters are revealed to have been convicted of some unnamed crime, but are granted a full pardon, which they are told they will be able to enjoy if they are able to escape alive from the dungeon they are promptly throw into, blah de blah de blah. Characters and plot are meaningless here, this game endeavors to be nothing more than a straight dungeon-crawl.

The four character set-up permits the player to control an entire adventuring party without needing to program friendly AI. The four units control as one, so the entire concept is basically needless. Sure, you can put the squishy ones in the back, and you can assign one person to bows and one to fisties and one to magic, but in the end there's nothing to distinguish the group from a multi-armed master of bows, blades, and magic.

Movement exists on a grid: you move forward, and take a quick rest when you reach the center of the next square before moving on. This might be alright, but it gets really annoying to view this from a first-person perspective, especially considering that you have a second button to turn yourself 90°. Combat is fiddly: you right-click on an icon indicating the weapon you wish to fight with. Personally, I'd prefer to just press a button on my keyboard (There's plenty there that I'm not using...), but over all it works alright...unless you want to cast magic. To do this, god help you, you must open a list of runes and click on the ones that will create the spell you want to cast. This means that you must make a minimum of three or four very precise clicks to attack with a spell (compared to the swordsman's one), during which you will not be able to attack with any of the three other character's weapons and a giant spider is attempting to eat your face. A similar process must be gone through if your archer runs out of arrows mid-fight.

About magic: your mage doesn't start with any spells. Nor can he learn any unless you find the appropriate scroll. Fine, but scrolls are scarce and specific. I created my character to cast air magic, made it three levels down with nary an air spell in sight, gave up and diversified into ice magic, losing the skill points I put into air. I might have been able to look up the runes needed on gamefaqs, but if I can't find the information I need in-game, I am not going to call this a good game! And even if I did that, It still won't let me forgive this game for letting me pour my thief's initial points into Archery, then letting me get to level three before letting me find a bow.

For all the above, however, I was still enjoying the game. Really, I was...until I reached about halfway through level two, when I ran into a lock but had no key. I don't mind a little backtracking to look for a key. What I do mind: All the hallways look exactly the same. There are the occasional landmark you can use to mark your location, but these are few and far between, and it can get very easy to get lost sometimes, and even easier to get bored.

I really wanted to like this game. The monsters are well designed, the concept is fine, and I had created a Minotaur with high skill in unarmed combat who I named "Mr. Punchy." But the flaws are too great for me to overcome. The world is too drab and unchanging, it's too easy to get lost, magic is badly done, and the lack of a real story means I really don't feel motivated to press on to see what awaits on the next level.

RIP Mr. Punchy. May you beat up Spiders in Cow Heaven.

Eldan

2013-08-18, 05:18 PM

Currently losing interest in: Dishonoured
Strange. I like stealth games. I like RPGs. I like games that affect an X-punk aesthetic. I even like watching cities full of miserable wretches. The combat is enjoyable. The atmosphere is gorgeous at times, especially the small texts from the Heart.
And yet, I'm not sure I can bring myself to finish this game and I can't even say why. It just doesn't quite click.

Also playing on the side: Shogun: Total War 2
Dug it out again after a few more months. Still not quite convinced of it. There just doesn't seem to be much variety in the kinds of units available and tactics get stale after a while. I'll probably dig out Rome again, instead.

Tempted to replay: Miasmata.
I've played it three or four times already and I keep coming back to this game. It's just so damn beautiful and I don't understand why not more people are talking about it. This game is damn near perfect, except for a few minor things. The music, the atmosphere, the landscape, the writing. And smaller things that have such a huge influence.
For those that don't know it: you are a scientist, stranged on a jungle island. You have to find the cure to a disease you are infected with, before you die of it. Another research team should be on the island somewhere, you just have to find them and their notes to solve this. But there also seems to be a monster out there, stalking you.
The disease is perfectly implemented into the game mechancis. You stumble around the island in first person perspective. Even if you walk slowly and carefully, you will occasionally stumble and fall, or slip on unstable ground.
Falling, swimming and running all exhaust you and the more exhausted you get, the worse your fever becomes. You are weak, your vision blurs, you gasp and struggle for breath and you stumble more often. Sometimes you break your neck or you drown. Running is dangerous. You can not stop quickly and if you don't see a cliff early enough to stop, you might die.
Cartography is interesting, too. You have a map and a compass. It just doesn't update automatically, like in other games. Instead, you have to bring your map up and find landmarks around you, marking their positions. If you can see at least two of them around you, you can start to triangulate your position, or the position of those landmarks relative to each other. Easier than it sounds, but very novel.
The island is gorgeous. Dark and light jungles, dense forests, tall grass, beautiful cherry trees, flowers taller than you, bamboo groves, it has everything. And all of it was made by two brothers in their spare time.

Might play next: The Longest Journey.
Loved that game years ago. Don't remember the details. Found it on steam.

warty goblin

2013-08-18, 07:06 PM

Landis963

2013-08-18, 08:18 PM

My problem with Dishonored was very, very simple. People kept talking. Between missions had endless seeming conversations between the protagonist, Mr. Catatonic Fencepost and various NPCs tragically afflicted with the all too common combination of Wild Gesticulation and Unnerving Vacant Stare Disorders. On missions it was lots of perching on suspiciously convenient ledges listening to guards have conversations about how EVIL your target/target organization is, where your MISSION OBJECTIVES are, and any ALTERNATE SOLUTIONS or SIDEQUESTS in this particular LEVEL.

It was like the Mr. Design Document reads bedtime stories for pathologically disturbed toddlers show.

They got rid of the inter-mission dialogues in Knife of Dunwall. Also, Daud talks, which makes him much more compelling. Also, they decided to make jokes out of some of those convenient conversations. ("Sir, I just wanted to say congratulations on getting your own squad.")

EDIT: I just feel as though I have to say it's made some improvement.

erikun

2013-08-19, 09:03 AM

Last Game Played: Dissidia Final Fantasy (PSP)
Note: The game seems to be scratched and keeps asking to return to the main PSP menu, so I don't think I'll be finishing it. However, I've played through a good amount of it and am probably finished with it overall.

The Good: If you happen to like Final Fantasy - and by that, I mean Final Fantasy games in general - then you'll probably find a lot to like about this game. There is one main character from each of the Final Fantasy games 1-10, along with a main villian, in the cast of characters. Characters were designed to look similar to their artwork from Amano, and a bit more impressive, all of them have a fairly decent characterization about them in their story modes. I liked seeing how Cecil and Golbez interacted throughout the game (I'm a fan of FF4) but it was interesting to see the interactions between Golbez and some of the other villians, particularly Jecht. It was also nice to see how they portrayed characters such as the Warrior of Light (FF1) and Onion Knight (FF3) since they didn't have personalities or even lines of dialogue in their games.

The screen appearance in the game is surprisingly good, especially considering the somewhat confusing system it uses. Dissidia is a 3D fighting game of sorts, but one where you can move around in nearly any direction you want. Attacks are broken up into Bravery attacks and HP attacks, with Bravery shown as a number above the health bar and HP the health bar itself. The Bravery number is large and clearly visible at all times, reflecting the Bravery status - from a normal white, to a greyed-out Break status, to a blue outline when it is high enough to kill an opponent - and surprisingly doesn't get in the way of anything.

There are several other mechanics that really work as well. The Achievements section made me weary at first, but it turns out you actually get items for accomplishing achievements - that makes it very welcome. Items are shared between all characters, and since you only play one at a time, there is no limit to how many characters can use a single item. (Unlike some similar games.)

The Bad: Okay, enough about what's good with the game. What's a problem with it?

First of all, things are poorly explained, both between the manual and the in-game information. Things like Battlegen and Multipliers aren't adequately explained anywhere, and it still leaves me a bit confused about how to activate them consistently. Characters have two kinds of attacks, Bravery and HP attacks, both of which are tied to a specific button. There are no combos per se, although some attacks will lead into others, which frequently means you'll either be using Bravery attacks to drop your opponent's Bravery to 0 (which increases your own Bravery) or using HP attacks to kill them. Which leads me to my second point - HP attacks are very slow. Yes, I appreciate being able to dodge a potential fatal attack, but the computer is always dodging them, which makes it aggrevating to just land the final blow on an opponent. You could use one of those Bravery attacks to catch an opponent and "combo" it into a HP attack, but that assumes they don't simply dodge the Bravery attack... and that you have the attack in the first place.

Which runs into my third problem. I realize that the games it is based on are RPGs, and I realize that the point of having moves gained by levels or the AP system of "mastering" moves is designed to feel like the proper RPG games. However, what ends up happening is that you just start with poor attacks which can't hit anything attempting to avoid them, meaning that your first playthrough with a character are learning attacks that you'll likely never use at higher levels, and attacks you'd use at higher levels you don't have available. This isn't such a problem against low level opponents, who walk right into everything, but at higher level...

Fourth problem, of course, is the leveling system. Levels, or to be more accurate, level-based equipment, becomes very important to hurt stronger opponents. Again, I understand the whole RPG thing, but when your Bravery attacks are doing 1 HP damage against someone with 1000+ Bravery, futility is the name of the game. It isn't a question of being skilled, it's a question of how good you are at running away and spamming ranged attacks and not being hit, as Bravery attacks which damage your Bravery add to theirs. Frequently, it's just not worth it to challenge anything 5+ levels above your own, simply due to stat differences.

What else? Higher level opponents dodge and block more, which means landing a final HP attack is just that much more bothersome. The computer cheats, from wearing equipment with levels above its own to dodge-cancelling out of moves that I'm fairly certain you can't actually do in play. Some moves have tremendous priority over others, to the point where the character is invincible when using it, and these moves tend to frequently be on the antagonists in story mode - and the computer loves spamming them. Good luck getting the timing right to pull off that slow HP attack and have it connect within the half-second between Cloud of Darkness's attacks, or somehow getting past the Emporer's continuous large, tracking, Flare spells.

Overall: One Thumb Up, One Thumb Down. Probably the most frustrating part of the game was that I actually liked seeing Golbez and Cecil talk, while cheesy, and seeing how it all played out. As such, I'll recommend it to anyone who's a big fan of one or several of the Final Fantasy games for the characters, as it's nice to see them together. However, it is incredibly frustrating for a fighting game, especially at higher levels. I'd only recommend it to people who are interested with said character interaction.

My scoring system:

Two Thumbs Up - Highly recommended, does just about everything right, is something that most people can probably enjoy.

One Thumb Up - Recommended, as the game is generally good and doesn't have many issues. However, it isn't absolutely amazing and may not be for everyone.

Zero Thumbs - Standard, average, the game isn't bad but there is very little to recommend it.

One Thumb Up, One Thumb Down - There are significant good points which make the game recommendable, but significant bad points which would discourage people from playing it. This is distinct from Zero Thumbs, as there are frequently reasons for enjoying it... if you can get over the noticable problems it has.

One Thumb Down - Not recommended. There may be some reason you'd want to play it, but it frequently has some serious problems that would make the average person not interested.

Two Thumbs Down - Avoid. There is little, if any, reason to play this game.

Three Stinking Feet - The game is just unplayable, either by poor design or some other reason.

Wookieetank

2013-08-20, 09:45 AM

Recently Finished:

Lume: A visually neat Adventure game, with hand crafted backgrounds. Is almost painfully short, and has obtuse puzzles for the most part, but is worth a look see if you enjoy unique visual styles. There's a sequal in the works.

Ben There Dan That: Rather average Adventure game, with a rough edged but cohesive art style. The dialog was quite entertaining though and laugh worthy more often than not for me.

Lego Star Wars 3: If you played Lego Star Wars 1, 2 or complete its similar enough to be familiar, but had enough new things to keep me entertained. Large scale epic battles with RTS elements thrown in where you could command troops, or run around in a speeder running over battle-droids kept things interesting for me. The space battles only really give you 2 dimensions of travel, but had enough going on in them to make them feel like you were in space. If you liked any of the other Lego Star Wars games I highly reccomend playing this one.

Currently playing sporadically:
Avernum 4, SR3

Up next to play: Something from my Steam Library of DOOM!

KazilDarkeye

2013-08-23, 07:22 PM

Just Finished:

Terminator: Salvation

Well, technically speaking it's not Terminator: Salvation as it is actually a prequel set 2 years before the events of the film. It's a cover-based shooter with 2-player local co-op (but I wasn't able to convince anyone else to try it, so I played alone).
The nicest things I can say for this game are that
1) It functions (usually)
2) The visuals and story are like the film's (a fairly backhanded compliment, but a compliment nonetheless)
My first note is that it's very short. I completed it in about 6 hours over a weekend, including about an hour in which I was stuck on one part of the third level. Admittedly, I was playing on hard mode and I had no experience with the game (or of cover-based shooters in general), but I was rather stymied by the fact that there didn't really seem to be enough cover in more than a few of the fights. For this one in particular I was facing 3 T-600's in a room with two floors, and due to the lack of cover, a sprint button or a manual duck button I was being reduced to half health before I even got to cover. Not to mention that most of the time my AI squad teammates got to the cover first and I wouldn't fit, that the nearby table with pipebombs was completely exposed to enemy fire, and that on one occasion one of the T-600's failed to spawn and as a result the game wouldn't acknowledge that I had actually defeated them.
There are parts of the game in which you can basically just put down the controller and let your team destroy the enemies for you, as they seem to be immune to bullets save one "mission" in which one has to set C4 charges and inexplicably loses that invulnerability. There were even times in which they were just standing out in the open because I had actually managed to reach cover first, taking bullets with absolutely no consequences. To counteract this obvious oversight, the enemies tend to target you more often than them and so you'll be the distraction more often that not.
There were only a few types of enemy, all of which had a recognisable pattern. On the other hand, I imagine that is how Skynet would usually fight, so meh. The actual shooting mechanics are serviceable, but there's nothing to collect and the game is completely linear. There is one enemy, a Harvester, who is built up as a major boss fight but then defeated and reprogrammed offscreen.
The acting isn't very good. In particular John Connor is not voiced by Christian Bale (who played him in the movie). There were a couple of incidents in which lines of dialogue seemed to play in the wrong order, and at one point one of your team chides another for calling the enemies 'robots'...I don't really know why. Many times I triggered a cutscene, walked down a corridor with no opposition whereupon another cutscene would trigger and reapeat about 3 more times before any actual fighting happened.
On a final note the Trophies (this was the PS3 version) are a complete joke. You get one trophy for beating each level, one for beating the game on Normal, one for beating it on Hard and a Platinum trophy for collecting all of the previous. From what I've read it's the same story for Achievements in the Xbox 360 version. Fortunately that means I only had to play it once and now I'm never toughing it again. I would give it a 3/10.

I also recently finished a co-op playthough of Borderlands with my sister. No DLCs or anything like that but we had a pretty good time. I would give that 7/10, and I would explain but I feel this has gone on long enough.