KickAssCop
[H]F Junkie
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Far Cry 6. 8.5 puta maricon pinga guerilla / 10.
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Review the game you finished recently.
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Blex
n00b
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I ever had the misfortune of playing.
ChoGGi
[H]ard|Gawd
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playing?
MooCow
[H]F Junkie
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Battlefield 2042
Played the 10 hour demo via the $5 EA play pass. Played the beta. Played 1 hour of the "full release". Tanks being air dropped on top of buildings and walls. Four player squads. It gives me an overall feeling of a game with great graphics, but hunk of garbage gameplay / fun factor.
Played the 10 hour demo via the $5 EA play pass. Played the beta. Played 1 hour of the "full release". Tanks being air dropped on top of buildings and walls. Four player squads. It gives me an overall feeling of a game with great graphics, but hunk of garbage gameplay / fun factor.
scojer
[H]F Junkie
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- Jun 13, 2009
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Deadly Premonition: The Director's Cut
Gameplay - 6/10 - This game is clunky, very clunky. You can only shoot a gun while standing still, when you use melee, there's only two swings that are animated and depending on the weapon used, they're slow or slightly faster swings, and you can only hit what's in front of you. There were times when I try to hit an enemy and swing beside them. There's a lot of driving in the game as well, and at first it sucks, you have a slow car and are limited to ~50 mph. Once you upgrade via a side mission the speed is a bit better, but handling still sucks, good luck making tight turns.
Graphics - 6/10 - This game came out in 2010, and the graphics don't really hold up. The game feels like it was made for the 6th gen era but made it's way onto 7th gen, the character models are not great, textures are muddy, lot's of jagged edges, and any movement by characters that are maybe 30 feet away are choppy to save on memory.
Audio - 4/10 - Terrible, just terrible. When you're walking it sounds like the horses from Monty Python and the Holy Grail... that's right, coconuts banged together, as mentioned earlier the cars have an artificial speed limit and when the engine maxes out, it's a constant "whirrRRrr" over and over. The enemies have the same handful of lines that repeat as you're shooting them, the gunfire at least sounds nice, and the soundtrack is quirky and fun.
Story - 8/10 - This is the saving grace of the game. The characters are quirky, it's a cool murder mystery with a supernatural twist, and if you're a fan of Twin Peaks, you'll love the story for this game. I'm not going to give any plot points away other than you're an FBI agent working a murder case in a small town in Washington State, connected to other murders across the country. Also the main character grows throughout the game, and you're along for the ride, so in a way it's like you too grow as a person while playing.
Pros - Great story, quirky but fun soundtrack, relatable characters
Cons - Clunky Gameplay, last gen graphics, annoying audio
Gameplay - 6/10 - This game is clunky, very clunky. You can only shoot a gun while standing still, when you use melee, there's only two swings that are animated and depending on the weapon used, they're slow or slightly faster swings, and you can only hit what's in front of you. There were times when I try to hit an enemy and swing beside them. There's a lot of driving in the game as well, and at first it sucks, you have a slow car and are limited to ~50 mph. Once you upgrade via a side mission the speed is a bit better, but handling still sucks, good luck making tight turns.
Graphics - 6/10 - This game came out in 2010, and the graphics don't really hold up. The game feels like it was made for the 6th gen era but made it's way onto 7th gen, the character models are not great, textures are muddy, lot's of jagged edges, and any movement by characters that are maybe 30 feet away are choppy to save on memory.
Audio - 4/10 - Terrible, just terrible. When you're walking it sounds like the horses from Monty Python and the Holy Grail... that's right, coconuts banged together, as mentioned earlier the cars have an artificial speed limit and when the engine maxes out, it's a constant "whirrRRrr" over and over. The enemies have the same handful of lines that repeat as you're shooting them, the gunfire at least sounds nice, and the soundtrack is quirky and fun.
Story - 8/10 - This is the saving grace of the game. The characters are quirky, it's a cool murder mystery with a supernatural twist, and if you're a fan of Twin Peaks, you'll love the story for this game. I'm not going to give any plot points away other than you're an FBI agent working a murder case in a small town in Washington State, connected to other murders across the country. Also the main character grows throughout the game, and you're along for the ride, so in a way it's like you too grow as a person while playing.
Pros - Great story, quirky but fun soundtrack, relatable characters
Cons - Clunky Gameplay, last gen graphics, annoying audio
scojer
[H]F Junkie
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Dark Sector PS3 version
Gameplay - 7/10 - The game is fun but short, and gets a little repetitive after a few levels. There are a couple of "driving" levels, but not enough, and later on you get to use a minigun that one of the heavy enemies use, but your accuracy is turned down to Star Wars Stormtrooper level. After trying to use it I got killed 3 times, after I said "eff it" and just used my pistol and glaive, I made it through with no problem. Throughout the game, those were my main weapons, occasionally I'd use a carbine/sniper or machine gun, but the pistol/glaive combo works so well that you don't really need to use anything else.
Graphics - 7/10 - This game is old, it came out in 2008, and it doesn't look terrible. The character models are low poly count, but the scenery looks good, with only an occasional texture "warped" on a rock or broken concrete.
Audio - 7/10 - The sound design is good, I would have liked some more variety in the sounds that the enemies make, especially the ones that turn invisible, when they "shift" in and out of visibility they make a noise that gets annoying very fast.
Story - 5/10 - The gameplay holds up the game, the story is weak and not very fleshed out, if the game was longer they could have expanded on it, but then they would have needed to add more variety to the gameplay as it did get a bit repetitive.
Overall it's a decent game if you're looking for something quick and fun to play, I had more fun than I did with Deadly Premonition, but the story wasn't as engaging.
Gameplay - 7/10 - The game is fun but short, and gets a little repetitive after a few levels. There are a couple of "driving" levels, but not enough, and later on you get to use a minigun that one of the heavy enemies use, but your accuracy is turned down to Star Wars Stormtrooper level. After trying to use it I got killed 3 times, after I said "eff it" and just used my pistol and glaive, I made it through with no problem. Throughout the game, those were my main weapons, occasionally I'd use a carbine/sniper or machine gun, but the pistol/glaive combo works so well that you don't really need to use anything else.
Graphics - 7/10 - This game is old, it came out in 2008, and it doesn't look terrible. The character models are low poly count, but the scenery looks good, with only an occasional texture "warped" on a rock or broken concrete.
Audio - 7/10 - The sound design is good, I would have liked some more variety in the sounds that the enemies make, especially the ones that turn invisible, when they "shift" in and out of visibility they make a noise that gets annoying very fast.
Story - 5/10 - The gameplay holds up the game, the story is weak and not very fleshed out, if the game was longer they could have expanded on it, but then they would have needed to add more variety to the gameplay as it did get a bit repetitive.
Overall it's a decent game if you're looking for something quick and fun to play, I had more fun than I did with Deadly Premonition, but the story wasn't as engaging.
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you're so obsessed with the concept of reviewing games that you are forgetting to actually 'play' the game...a lot of big AAA titles you're only getting through the prologue/tutorial after the first few hours...can someone really review RDR2 after 2 hours?...Last of Us 2? Assassin's Creed: Valhalla etc...2022 has some huge games such as Elden Ring, Dying Light 2 etc which require some time before you actually get to the heart of the story...maybe you should stick to reviewing indie or mobile games which can be completed in a few hours
funkydmunky
2[H]4U
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- Aug 28, 2008
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- 3,869
MSFS 2020 in VR. You can't really finish a sim or at least a good one but... as a son of a bush pilot who logged over 700hrs as a kid growing up I feel some what qualified to judge. It is very well done. Truely gives the sense of being there. Everything is quite realistic on my now pedestrian RTX2080 and looked impressive on my Samsung Odyssey+ and my new HP G2.
The game never fails to provide me with a fun experience whether I am site seeing or trying a challenging poor weather landing on a remote air strip. The update pace has been good and gives me confidence that this game is fully backed and will improve well into the future. 9/10
The game never fails to provide me with a fun experience whether I am site seeing or trying a challenging poor weather landing on a remote air strip. The update pace has been good and gives me confidence that this game is fully backed and will improve well into the future. 9/10
M76
[H]F Junkie
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WTF are you talking about. This is ridicilous. Why are you trying to create a false narrative? This is worse than outright lying.
Here is what I said about RE7:
Yet you are trying to present a narrative where I'm reviewing games after the first 1-2 hours.
You should be ashamed for using such underhanded tactics.
psychonautZERO
n00b
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- Feb 6, 2020
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- 38
Far cry 6, 8/10
OneofMillion
n00b
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- May 19, 2021
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- 20
Slay the Spire - great game and very addictive, but terribly short. I went through it all in one evening
M76
[H]F Junkie
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Snowrunner
To tedium or not to tedium
Introduction
Seeing how the game has so few concurrent players on Steam, it seems that it wasn't such a bright idea to make this game an EGS exclusive after all. I firmly believe had they released in on Steam day and date with workshop and community support the game could've been massively more successful.The game itself is a direct evolution of Spintires and Mudrunner. It's still the same game under the hood, with minor technical improvements, but instead of focusing solely on old Russian equipment now it features some licensed US vehicles as well. And hauling logs is no longer the only activity.
Gameplay
The biggest difference gameplay wise to the previos games is that now you can buy, sell, and upgrade vehicles. So the goal is no longer just explore the map and transport 3 logs to the log station, but there are various map related missions and contracts you can take on.It's a little confusing how some trucks are unlocked by simply exploring the map and finding them, while others are readily available for purchase in the shop, if it's not locked behind a level wall that is.
Unfortunately there is a level system. Which I'm not a big fan of in any game, especially when its purpose is to wall you from accessing certain QOL upgrades, or items despite having enough in-game currency to buy them. Like it is the case here.
Most vehicle upgrades outside of tyres are only unlockable by finding them in the world. Which means the most efficient method would be to explore the entire world with a light scout vehicle and unlock all upgrades before doing anything else. But this is just not a realistic scenario for anyone to approach the game. As just driving from upgrade location to upgrade location would become terribly boring fast.
So the method you stuck with is to explore a little bit, find some upgrades and missions and try to do as many of them as possible with the equipment available to you. Of course this leads to a catch-22 because you will struggle a lot more trying to complete missions with inferior equipment. And what might take 10 minutes with a fully upgraded off road truck, can be an hour long struggle if even possible at all with one that lacks differential locks or even an AWD system and appropriate tyres.
But the only way to tell if your eqipment is capable of finishing a job, is by trying. And this leads to the sunken cost fallacy, when you already spent half an hour trying to complete a job, you are not going to abandon it, until it is beyond hopeless. This leads to what is supposed to be a relaxing and chill game becoming one of the most infuriating titles I've played.
The annoying nature of the game is exacerbated by the lack of a manual saves. So you can't save before or after hard to navigate difficult parts of the journey. If you fall off a cliff, the entire hour you spent on getting to that spot is null and void and you have to try again from the start, or mount an excruiating rescue mission to recover the lost cargo or vehicle.
I can already hear in my mind the excuse. But no, having to repeat an hour long tedious but not particularly hard section is not a healthy challenge. It's not even a challenge, it's just the designers showing me the middle finger while wasting my time. The hard bit would be just the same if I was allowed to try it again without having to go through everything that lead up to it. This is the equivalent to a permadeath mode in other games. But here it is the only gameplay mode.
Well not only, there is an additional hard mode, where recovery to garage and fuel costs money, and you can only sell stuff at half price, but the biggest difference is that easy loading of cargo is disabled. You have to manually crane in every piece everywhere. There are some missions in normal mode where you have to manually crane stuff, and believe me that is more than enough, especially because the camera works terrible in crane mode, half the time you don't see what you need to see properly.
Downloadable content galore
The game has numerous DLCs and season passes, it's really confusing, which is part of what season pass and how to obtain. The base game itself has 3 regions to explore. Unfortunately they all seemed mediocre to me. My favorite map so far was Wisconsin, which is part of the season 3 update, which is part of the year 1 pass. Confusing right?That said there is enough content in the game to last a lifetime. There are so many missions and jobs to take on that doing them all should take hundreds of hours by my estimate.
Talking about maps, they are about 90% mud or snow, with only the remaining 10% being hard surface, which raises an interesting conondrum. The game includes a variety of highway trucks that lack any offroad capability, they can't even be upgraded to be suited to off road driving. Yet there are barely any locations in the game you can travel between on proper roads. Which raises the question of why even include these vehicles that are ill suited for any mission in the game? If there was at least one region or even just a map that has a good road network, their existence in game would be instantly justified.
Still related to the maps is one of the negatives of the game, that they are all completely lifeless. You are the only movement in the entire game world, there isn't even wildlife. So it seems more like a post apocalyptic game than anything alse. Adding some AI traffic would greatly improve immersion. And even just a simple thing like adding talking heads as mission givers would be a much needed improvement.
Physics
Due to its nature this is the most important part of the game. And it's a mixed bag. Some things it does great while other times it goes completely wild or does things that are quite unrealistic. The deformable terrain and water modelling is great. What is not great however is that everything seems like you are in rubber world. Trucks bounce like basketballs, if you accidentally go into a fallen tree it will act like a slingshot and catapult you back with twice the force. Ridiculous.And there are the rare freak occurences where driving over completely flat terrian your truck will suddenly flip on its side, or sustain great amounts of damage for no apparent reason.
And vehicles powertrains are completely out of touch with reality. The RPM counter is meaningless, it is arbitrary, there seems to be no gears in the trucks just a rubber band driving the wheels, like a moped. The top speed of all trucks is between 20-40mph. Which becomes even less on mud, it feels like driving in glue. There is no wheelspin to talk of, when you hit a boggy part the truck seems to simply loose power and struggle to move instead of the wheels spinning out, like your engine has lost 90% of its power output.
There are various locations on the maps where a fully loaded truck just goes through without a problem, while a light vehicle instantly sinks through the mud and gets trapped becoming completely unable to move. Like someone accidentally switched a + with a - in the physics engine.
Graphics
The graphics is improved quite a bit, the atmospheric effects and light rays are quite good, buying extra lights actually matters in this game. The overall look of the game is very homogeneous. And I say that as an absolute positive. Nothing stands out, the feel and atmoshpere of the game is consistent.Pros and cons
+
- Lots of content
- Evolution of the previous games
- Consistently good graphics
- When you get into the rhythm, it becomes addictive
- Works great with Keyboard, you don't need an analog controller
- There is some strategy aspect to it as well
-
- Gets very tedious and repetitive at times
- Level walls making the early game even more tedious
- No manual saves
- Infuriating when you have to restart a mission after sinking a ton of time into it
- Powertrain simulation
- Lifeless maps
Verdict
Graphics: 7/10Physics: 5/10
Atmosphere: 7/10
Overall impression: 7/10
If you are OK with tedium and like big rigs, then it is a good game. But if you want quick rewards and action then it's not your game.
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Alien: Isolation
This game was quite the experience. Alien Isolation was a complete thrill ride to the end. Really enjoyed this one due to the setting, the suspense, the story and the gameplay was all very much enjoyable. Hearing the alien bouncing around above or below you in the vents really gave a feeling of anxiety as I never knew when it would emerge and we would have to play hide and seek for a bit. The station that you are on is really large and offers a nice mix of exploration with several paths to a location but there are some linear areas.
My hope is maybe we get a sequel at some point to continue with the story as I would love to jump back into this setting.
This game was quite the experience. Alien Isolation was a complete thrill ride to the end. Really enjoyed this one due to the setting, the suspense, the story and the gameplay was all very much enjoyable. Hearing the alien bouncing around above or below you in the vents really gave a feeling of anxiety as I never knew when it would emerge and we would have to play hide and seek for a bit. The station that you are on is really large and offers a nice mix of exploration with several paths to a location but there are some linear areas.
My hope is maybe we get a sequel at some point to continue with the story as I would love to jump back into this setting.
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silentsod
Gawd
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2010
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- 638
Correct - I am doing Yukon last after playing base game + the other Year 1 DLCs and am clocking over 400 hours.
That includes a not-insignificant chunk of time put into my son's game so he can see things get built, but there's literally hundreds of hours of low stakes gameplay to be had.
I also find that if I'm slogging through a section the answer is I'm supposed to use different gear (raised KOLOB; ZikZ 605R; raised longboi Azov for Amur and not the offroad trucks I had been using and favoring, as an example) or a different path altogether (skirting around on ice and climbing up a rocky hill face instead of sticking to the obvious trail).
For whatever reason the offroad delivery simulator was the exact game for the exact moment this year after I blitzed 50 some odd titles and DLCs in the first 8 months.
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scojer
[H]F Junkie
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Black - PS2 edition
Gameplay - 8/10 - This is a fun game, lots of shooting, lots of ways to kill enemies for a game that came out when it did, and it's all done at a nice casual pace. My only gripe initially was that you couldn't increase look sensitivity but I eventually figured it out and had a blast.
Graphics - 9/10 - This game looks gorgeous for the time period, by today's standards it would be more like a 6/10, but it still holds up, only times it didn't was in a cave or near rocks, the textures are very muddied and blocky.
Audio - 10/10 - The audio is very well done, every gun sounds great, every bullet hit has a satisfying thud, and the radio chatter feels fresh.
Story - 3/10 - The story is almost non-existent. It's just go in and blow shit up, supposedly I killed some "big bad guys" but had no idea I did until I finished a level. I looked into the game after and it seems the story was an afterthought, the developers just wanted to make a fun shoot 'em up game.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_(video_game) said:
Pros - Shoot everything.
Cons - Joystick sensitivity is slow.
Furious_Styles
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Jan 16, 2013
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- 4,530
Doom 3 + expansion
First off I'll say that my memory of playing it back near release was that it was an okay game overall. Really good graphics but mediocre in the gameplay and story department. Also the only mod I used was a graphical upgrade mod to make it look a bit better.
Pros:
Graphics
Weapons
Cons:
60 fps limit
Sluggish movement
Monster closets galore
I know the devs tried to take a different approach with this game into a more horror themed game, but I don't think it really worked. It didn't feel like you were playing a doom game besides the familiar enemies and weapons. You're slow and weapon switching is also pretty slow, plus every gun has a mag that you must reload. And the level design feels very cramped and the endless amount of monster closets wasn't particularly fun. You basically did a 180 whenever enemies spawned because there was a good chance there would always be one behind you. Also the PDA system wasn't that great either, sometimes you would sit there listening for 1-2 minutes just to get a locker code. Overall I'd give it a 7/10.
First off I'll say that my memory of playing it back near release was that it was an okay game overall. Really good graphics but mediocre in the gameplay and story department. Also the only mod I used was a graphical upgrade mod to make it look a bit better.
Pros:
Graphics
Weapons
Cons:
60 fps limit
Sluggish movement
Monster closets galore
I know the devs tried to take a different approach with this game into a more horror themed game, but I don't think it really worked. It didn't feel like you were playing a doom game besides the familiar enemies and weapons. You're slow and weapon switching is also pretty slow, plus every gun has a mag that you must reload. And the level design feels very cramped and the endless amount of monster closets wasn't particularly fun. You basically did a 180 whenever enemies spawned because there was a good chance there would always be one behind you. Also the PDA system wasn't that great either, sometimes you would sit there listening for 1-2 minutes just to get a locker code. Overall I'd give it a 7/10.
scojer
[H]F Junkie
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Gameplay: 8/10 - The world of SP translates great into a video game format, moving around the environments is easy, the battles are fun, and the humor written into the gameplay, when it was done, was good, but could have used just a bit more of it. (Ex. Jimmy stuttering and it encourages you to skip it, a battle that they recommend you skip otherwise it'd be a waste of time, battle ends and you get kidnapped anyways, etc.)
Graphics: 10/10 - It looks just like you're watching an episode of SP, not sure how it could have gotten any better.
Audio: 9/10 - Sounds just like an episode of SP, it did get a bit repetitive when the sounds repeated so often.
Story: 8/10 - Story was a good sp plot, definitely what you'd expect from the universe.
Pros: You're playing an episode of SP, gameplay is fun, humor is good (If you like SP humor)
Cons: Some of the sounds are a bit repetitive, that's about it.
Domingo
Fully [H]
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- Jul 30, 2004
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- 22,636
Back 4 Blood (PC via Game Pass)
Graphics 9/10: The game looks good for the most part and runs well. On high-end hardware you'll find that 4K and 100+ FPS is perfectly doable. The environment isn't as detailed as say, the Last of Us 2, but you'll be moving around so much and so quickly that you probably won't notice. The game is known to cover your screen with huge volumes of zombies along with status effects, fire, explosions, etc. all without bogging down. I can't think of a single instance where things bogged down or crashed.
Sound 8/10: The sound effects and music are appropriate. Not great, but not really flawed either. Voice acting is intentionally campy. Maybe too much so, honestly. There really isn't much else to say.
Story: I'm not even going to score this because the story is basically about a zombie outbreak in western Pennsylvania. That's really pretty much it. The game adds some additional touches and background here and there, but your goal is almost always to kill everything and/or make it to a safe room on the other side of the map.
Gameplay/Overview: Back 4 Blood is essentially an attempt to revive the Left 4 Dead series by another developer. It's unapologetically similar in a good way. It has the same setting, the same gameplay (mostly), same look, etc. It also shares the game focus on multiplayer (or bot controlled) team-focused play and the option to play as the zombies vs. survivors. If you like the older games, you'll probably like this one.
That isn't to say it's perfect, though. The game adds card decks to the mix, which can boost certain attributes (and enemies) to add some randomness. I find that the cards affect things more than I'd like. Certain types of zombie status effects make them incredibly powerful. Others cards might as well not even be there. I'm not a fan of randomness affecting a game like that. Certain zombies are better than others to begin with, and with cards in the mix, that gets amplified. I feel like L4D had better balance to the enemy types. In terms of playing the survivors (what most people will be doing) the game is needlessly long and too large to sustain itself. The game has 30+ missions and roughly 1/3 of them feel phoned in. I wish the developers cut down the sheer number of missions and put that effort into other areas instead. The game starts to drag by the end of chapter 2 and some levels feel phoned in compared to others. I like the variety of weapons and there's definitely something for everyone. It might seem like some weapons aren't as good as others, but upgrades and varying situations surprisingly do a nice job of balancing them out. Worth noting, the difficulty is all over the place. Some levels are absolutely a breeze while others are soul crushing. The final levels are especially difficult and overwhelm you with volume and chaos.
Overall: 7/10. I like the game. I wish it was shorter and less repetitious. The devs went with the strategy of adding more content instead of curating what they had. It still absolutely works, but it makes for an inconsistent experience.
Graphics 9/10: The game looks good for the most part and runs well. On high-end hardware you'll find that 4K and 100+ FPS is perfectly doable. The environment isn't as detailed as say, the Last of Us 2, but you'll be moving around so much and so quickly that you probably won't notice. The game is known to cover your screen with huge volumes of zombies along with status effects, fire, explosions, etc. all without bogging down. I can't think of a single instance where things bogged down or crashed.
Sound 8/10: The sound effects and music are appropriate. Not great, but not really flawed either. Voice acting is intentionally campy. Maybe too much so, honestly. There really isn't much else to say.
Story: I'm not even going to score this because the story is basically about a zombie outbreak in western Pennsylvania. That's really pretty much it. The game adds some additional touches and background here and there, but your goal is almost always to kill everything and/or make it to a safe room on the other side of the map.
Gameplay/Overview: Back 4 Blood is essentially an attempt to revive the Left 4 Dead series by another developer. It's unapologetically similar in a good way. It has the same setting, the same gameplay (mostly), same look, etc. It also shares the game focus on multiplayer (or bot controlled) team-focused play and the option to play as the zombies vs. survivors. If you like the older games, you'll probably like this one.
That isn't to say it's perfect, though. The game adds card decks to the mix, which can boost certain attributes (and enemies) to add some randomness. I find that the cards affect things more than I'd like. Certain types of zombie status effects make them incredibly powerful. Others cards might as well not even be there. I'm not a fan of randomness affecting a game like that. Certain zombies are better than others to begin with, and with cards in the mix, that gets amplified. I feel like L4D had better balance to the enemy types. In terms of playing the survivors (what most people will be doing) the game is needlessly long and too large to sustain itself. The game has 30+ missions and roughly 1/3 of them feel phoned in. I wish the developers cut down the sheer number of missions and put that effort into other areas instead. The game starts to drag by the end of chapter 2 and some levels feel phoned in compared to others. I like the variety of weapons and there's definitely something for everyone. It might seem like some weapons aren't as good as others, but upgrades and varying situations surprisingly do a nice job of balancing them out. Worth noting, the difficulty is all over the place. Some levels are absolutely a breeze while others are soul crushing. The final levels are especially difficult and overwhelm you with volume and chaos.
Overall: 7/10. I like the game. I wish it was shorter and less repetitious. The devs went with the strategy of adding more content instead of curating what they had. It still absolutely works, but it makes for an inconsistent experience.
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Comixbooks
Fully [H]
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- Jun 7, 2008
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- 22,014
DLC is in the works
Domingo
Fully [H]
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- Jul 30, 2004
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- 22,636
Honestly, I don't know if the game needs DLC. At least level-wise. It's too big as it is. Some new weapons and monsters could be welcome I guess.
It needs a bit of dlc, mainly it needs to mix in more elements from L4D like gather and defend points. It could also use more maps with a darker enviroment, and more special infected.
harmattan
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Feb 11, 2008
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- 5,129
Just finished Deathloop and I agree completely with your assessment. It's a good game. It's an Arkane game, yes. But it doesn't really know what it wants to be. Is it a straightforward shooter? A stealth-assassin game? A story-driven RPG? Ehhh... sort of all of them. I like the time loop premise in concept (someone had to try to integrate it into a game, after all). But it ends up being more tedious than fun, likely as a time loop would be in reality. The dialogue is snappy and VA excellent. It definitely takes stylistic cues from great games e.g. NOLF, XIII.
I did enjoy it more than most AAA games from the past year, so there's that. And at least it tries to do something novel. Will I go back to replay? Not likely, at least not like I do with Dishonored or Prey.
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Flogger23m
[H]F Junkie
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- Jun 19, 2009
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- 14,364
Marvel's Guardians Of The Galaxy
Tired of long, grinding fetch quest based single player games? Looking for something styled after more traditional single player story based experiences? If you are, this game might be for you, assuming you like action adventure games. Guardian's Of The Galaxy is a simple game which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The lore appears to be based off of the comic books rather than the movies, but if you're a fan of either this game should be at least somewhat appealing.
Ready for a single player game that is based around a story? If yes, follow your of questionable competence captain. Or ring leader. Or whatever he thinks he is supposed to be.
Gameplay:
The gameplay in GotG is straight forward and not too complex however is enough to hold the game up. The gameplay resembles other action adventure or action RPG games from recent years, such as Mass Effect. The game is primarily based around shooting, using your team's powers/abilities, combinations and using different types of ammo on different types of foes. On one hand your pistols are a little too weak, melee isn't the most ideal attack to use in most instance, which means you'll rely much more heavily on your team's abilities as well as your own. Abilities are your main source of damage output against enemies. Throughout the game each Guardian will get new abilities. Typically each character gets one that does a lot of damage, or more stagger, or hold down enemies.
This attack deals devistating damage, but you'll want another Guardian holding down your target to deal the most damage.
As the game progresses some of the more difficult fights will require some smart use of these abilities. You might want to have one Gaurdian hold down enemies, while you use anti shield ammo on another, and then get another Guardian to deal the heavy damage. The game never requires extreme levels of coordination, but at least gives a bit of a challenge and requires you do to more than spam the shoot or attack button. The overall combat feels like a less fine tuned Mass Effect in some ways.
There are upgrades outside of abilities, which are achieved by picking up scrap. Not very original, but it isn't excessively tedious as the map design is small and linear.
Perks are a little different from abilities/attacks and focus purely on the player's character.
It is worth mentioning twice that the game is linear. Most areas do not have multiple pathways, and you don't have many options for tackling a problem. This itself can make the game feel a bit repetitive at points, but it also avoids excessive traveling and downtime. When you're not fighting you're typically walking down a corridor or talking with crew members in your ship. The dialogue never lets up. Characters are always bantering with each other, in a manner I felt was similar enough to the movies. This makes the corridor walks more interesting than a lot of open world games these days so I don't necessarily feel the linear nature was a big downside. Something is always going on with the characters, even when doing mundane things. This kept me invested in the game and the story as it progressed more so than many other recent games.
Do enough damage quickly and you'll be able to execute finishing moves with your team.
One issue cannot be overlooked when playing with a mouse/keyboard. The default control layout is not optimal and the general control scheme was designed around a controller. It requires you to hold control or shift (don't recall which), and then hit 1-5 to select your Guardian, and then 1-4 to select their ability. Sounds simple until you start running, jumping, dodging, and shooting at enemies. Miss clicks happen a lot and occasionally I would cancel the action as my finger wasn't holding control/shift down. This made issuing attacks harder than it should have been.
When you're doing well, you get the option to give a mid combat motivational or de-motivational speech that powers up the Guardians temporarily.
Story:
The story in GotG isn't sophisticated. But it is well narrated, present, and practically everything you do relates to the story at hand which helps the game immensely. Like many other similar games, movies or TV shows with similar settings it starts small and snowballs into something larger. Some characters get heavily invested into certain things as the story progresses. This creates reasonable rifts within the Guardians as a group that never seem out of place. These things generally build up over the course of the game which makes it more believable. Again, nothing groundbreaking happens. It takes a simple story and just executes it well by focusing purely on the story missions and omitting grind quests completely.
Character banter and dialogue in general is good.
The characters themselves will have conversations and dialogue sequences on the ship between missions. You do have some options although practically nothing has any impact. This game is not an RPG, and dialogue decisions rarely matter. Although some do in small ways. This too isn't necessarily a bad thing in my opinion. The game seems to follow other games like Mass Effect in which there are long gameplay sequences broken up by moderately long conversation/dialogue sequences back at your ship.
You can talk to characters between story missions, and listen to them talk amongst themselves.
Finally there is a lot of lore in game regarding different unlock-able outfits, monsters, planets, characters, places and more. This helped add some context for me as I am not a fan of GotG and have only watched the movies, which was a nice touch.
The game's story will take you to many different places and levels, many of which look different. This helps keep the game fresh and prevents visual tedium.
Occasionally you'll be able to pilot your ship. The controls are terrible and it is a low point in the game. Wish it was developed further.
Graphics / Technical Aspects:
Graphically the game looks fairly nice. Lighting looks great. Most assets also look great in general. Character design looks good as well. Some of the effects like explosions/energy/gun fire could have been a little more detailed and there is the occasional lower resolution texture, but overall the game generally looks good. Ray tracing does not seem to make much of a difference but I left it on with DLSS and achieved a good 70-80 frame rates in most scenes. There is occasionally some stutter but it isn't that common. Character lip syncing animations work okay but occasionally they seem to de-sync which can look awkward. But it certainly isn't up to par with games like Resident Evil 2/3 Remake.
Graphically the game shines with its lighting effects. My humor needs work.
There were occasionally some minor bugs when trying to interact with a particular object onboard your ship. There were a few crashes if I recall. Aside from that the game ran good. Generally there are few if any gameplay bugs aside from the one mentioned. Some minor patches fixing the few stability issues would make this game near perfect.
Summary:
Marvel's Guardian's Of The Galaxy is a competent game. It calls back to a time when single player games were story driven and chapter based, and does an excellent job of doing just that. Games are supposed to be fun, without endless tedious activities and tangents. Nothing is exceptionally spectacular but it is well rounded. From the start of the game to the end, it never lets up. You always know what you're doing and why with plenty of context with fun if simplistic gameplay.
8 / 10
Tired of long, grinding fetch quest based single player games? Looking for something styled after more traditional single player story based experiences? If you are, this game might be for you, assuming you like action adventure games. Guardian's Of The Galaxy is a simple game which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The lore appears to be based off of the comic books rather than the movies, but if you're a fan of either this game should be at least somewhat appealing.
Ready for a single player game that is based around a story? If yes, follow your of questionable competence captain. Or ring leader. Or whatever he thinks he is supposed to be.
Gameplay:
The gameplay in GotG is straight forward and not too complex however is enough to hold the game up. The gameplay resembles other action adventure or action RPG games from recent years, such as Mass Effect. The game is primarily based around shooting, using your team's powers/abilities, combinations and using different types of ammo on different types of foes. On one hand your pistols are a little too weak, melee isn't the most ideal attack to use in most instance, which means you'll rely much more heavily on your team's abilities as well as your own. Abilities are your main source of damage output against enemies. Throughout the game each Guardian will get new abilities. Typically each character gets one that does a lot of damage, or more stagger, or hold down enemies.
This attack deals devistating damage, but you'll want another Guardian holding down your target to deal the most damage.
As the game progresses some of the more difficult fights will require some smart use of these abilities. You might want to have one Gaurdian hold down enemies, while you use anti shield ammo on another, and then get another Guardian to deal the heavy damage. The game never requires extreme levels of coordination, but at least gives a bit of a challenge and requires you do to more than spam the shoot or attack button. The overall combat feels like a less fine tuned Mass Effect in some ways.
There are upgrades outside of abilities, which are achieved by picking up scrap. Not very original, but it isn't excessively tedious as the map design is small and linear.
Perks are a little different from abilities/attacks and focus purely on the player's character.
It is worth mentioning twice that the game is linear. Most areas do not have multiple pathways, and you don't have many options for tackling a problem. This itself can make the game feel a bit repetitive at points, but it also avoids excessive traveling and downtime. When you're not fighting you're typically walking down a corridor or talking with crew members in your ship. The dialogue never lets up. Characters are always bantering with each other, in a manner I felt was similar enough to the movies. This makes the corridor walks more interesting than a lot of open world games these days so I don't necessarily feel the linear nature was a big downside. Something is always going on with the characters, even when doing mundane things. This kept me invested in the game and the story as it progressed more so than many other recent games.
Do enough damage quickly and you'll be able to execute finishing moves with your team.
One issue cannot be overlooked when playing with a mouse/keyboard. The default control layout is not optimal and the general control scheme was designed around a controller. It requires you to hold control or shift (don't recall which), and then hit 1-5 to select your Guardian, and then 1-4 to select their ability. Sounds simple until you start running, jumping, dodging, and shooting at enemies. Miss clicks happen a lot and occasionally I would cancel the action as my finger wasn't holding control/shift down. This made issuing attacks harder than it should have been.
When you're doing well, you get the option to give a mid combat motivational or de-motivational speech that powers up the Guardians temporarily.
Story:
The story in GotG isn't sophisticated. But it is well narrated, present, and practically everything you do relates to the story at hand which helps the game immensely. Like many other similar games, movies or TV shows with similar settings it starts small and snowballs into something larger. Some characters get heavily invested into certain things as the story progresses. This creates reasonable rifts within the Guardians as a group that never seem out of place. These things generally build up over the course of the game which makes it more believable. Again, nothing groundbreaking happens. It takes a simple story and just executes it well by focusing purely on the story missions and omitting grind quests completely.
Character banter and dialogue in general is good.
The characters themselves will have conversations and dialogue sequences on the ship between missions. You do have some options although practically nothing has any impact. This game is not an RPG, and dialogue decisions rarely matter. Although some do in small ways. This too isn't necessarily a bad thing in my opinion. The game seems to follow other games like Mass Effect in which there are long gameplay sequences broken up by moderately long conversation/dialogue sequences back at your ship.
You can talk to characters between story missions, and listen to them talk amongst themselves.
Finally there is a lot of lore in game regarding different unlock-able outfits, monsters, planets, characters, places and more. This helped add some context for me as I am not a fan of GotG and have only watched the movies, which was a nice touch.
The game's story will take you to many different places and levels, many of which look different. This helps keep the game fresh and prevents visual tedium.
Occasionally you'll be able to pilot your ship. The controls are terrible and it is a low point in the game. Wish it was developed further.
Graphics / Technical Aspects:
Graphically the game looks fairly nice. Lighting looks great. Most assets also look great in general. Character design looks good as well. Some of the effects like explosions/energy/gun fire could have been a little more detailed and there is the occasional lower resolution texture, but overall the game generally looks good. Ray tracing does not seem to make much of a difference but I left it on with DLSS and achieved a good 70-80 frame rates in most scenes. There is occasionally some stutter but it isn't that common. Character lip syncing animations work okay but occasionally they seem to de-sync which can look awkward. But it certainly isn't up to par with games like Resident Evil 2/3 Remake.
Graphically the game shines with its lighting effects. My humor needs work.
There were occasionally some minor bugs when trying to interact with a particular object onboard your ship. There were a few crashes if I recall. Aside from that the game ran good. Generally there are few if any gameplay bugs aside from the one mentioned. Some minor patches fixing the few stability issues would make this game near perfect.
Summary:
Marvel's Guardian's Of The Galaxy is a competent game. It calls back to a time when single player games were story driven and chapter based, and does an excellent job of doing just that. Games are supposed to be fun, without endless tedious activities and tangents. Nothing is exceptionally spectacular but it is well rounded. From the start of the game to the end, it never lets up. You always know what you're doing and why with plenty of context with fun if simplistic gameplay.
8 / 10
Furious_Styles
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Jan 16, 2013
- Messages
- 4,530
I'm going to do 2 short reviews:
Prey
Excellent game, first game that reminded me very much of Deus Ex, which is one of my favorites. The graphics were very good, the performance was excellent and the story was well told and interesting. The gameplay is also fun, you get lots of options on how you wish to approach/play the game. I highly recommend this game and would give it a 9/10.
Halo infinite
I will start by noting that the last Halo game I played was 2. So I wasn't very up to date on the story. However I don't think that matters much. I liked the first 2 and the halo gameplay was typically pretty fun. Infinite is much of the same honestly, very familiar enemies and guns. This time you have an open world portion to start and it's pretty decent. I did most of the stuff but not all, skipping lots of skins and just getting the suit upgrades. The mistake I made was playing on legendary. I swear I don't think they played it on this difficulty or they would have made some changes on lots of the boss fights. You just get 1 shot so many times it is just frustrating and tedious rather than being fun and challenging. I also had weird performance issues where the game felt laggy when the FPS was high. I figured out that the nvidia low latency simply doesn't work with the game either. I rarely play games on release so I'm sure these issues will be fixed in ensuing patches. The other criticism I have is they needed to cut out some of the cortana cutscenes in the last 2 hour or so end sequence. They really added nothing and after all it's an AI not Chief's gf or wife or anything. 7/10
Prey
Excellent game, first game that reminded me very much of Deus Ex, which is one of my favorites. The graphics were very good, the performance was excellent and the story was well told and interesting. The gameplay is also fun, you get lots of options on how you wish to approach/play the game. I highly recommend this game and would give it a 9/10.
Halo infinite
I will start by noting that the last Halo game I played was 2. So I wasn't very up to date on the story. However I don't think that matters much. I liked the first 2 and the halo gameplay was typically pretty fun. Infinite is much of the same honestly, very familiar enemies and guns. This time you have an open world portion to start and it's pretty decent. I did most of the stuff but not all, skipping lots of skins and just getting the suit upgrades. The mistake I made was playing on legendary. I swear I don't think they played it on this difficulty or they would have made some changes on lots of the boss fights. You just get 1 shot so many times it is just frustrating and tedious rather than being fun and challenging. I also had weird performance issues where the game felt laggy when the FPS was high. I figured out that the nvidia low latency simply doesn't work with the game either. I rarely play games on release so I'm sure these issues will be fixed in ensuing patches. The other criticism I have is they needed to cut out some of the cortana cutscenes in the last 2 hour or so end sequence. They really added nothing and after all it's an AI not Chief's gf or wife or anything. 7/10
Domingo
Fully [H]
- Joined
- Jul 30, 2004
- Messages
- 22,636
Prey might be one of the best "under the radar" titles from the last decade. At least titles from a major developer. I wish they named it something different as I'm sure that's done it no favors.
sharknice
2[H]4U
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- Nov 12, 2012
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- 3,754
What? Prey was huge when it came out. Not Skyrim or game of the decade huge, but it was very big.
They definitely could have used a different name though. I wish they would have kept it for a sequel to the 2006 game, but that was probably never going to happen anyways.
harmattan
Supreme [H]ardness
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- Feb 11, 2008
- Messages
- 5,129
I think Prey 2017's issues were around lack of a focused brand, and that it doesn't immediately hit you over the head as a great game. People (reviewers included) didn't really know how to describe it, and many people put it down after the first hour or so since there's no immediate dopamine pay off. You really need to stick with it for a few hours to get it's value. It was advertised as a AAA, yes, but people didn't really latch onto it. As such, I'd definitely qualify it as a sleeper hit since a good many people didn't get into it until they bought on discount or picked it back up after a long time.
Also, agreed they could have even done with a different name and left "Prey" to the original IP.
All this Arkane tried to rectify with Deathloop: over-the-top poppy style, gimmicky story and game mechanics, and jazzed-up UI.
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Denpepe
2[H]4U
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- Oct 26, 2015
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- 2,269
My main issue with prey is the enemy design, found it annoying and gave up after slightly less then 4 hours according to steam, it's one of those games I keep installed with the intention of fninishing it someday, doubt it will happen though.
harmattan
Supreme [H]ardness
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- Feb 11, 2008
- Messages
- 5,129
AC Valhalla (mini-review)
Caveat: I'm about 60% through the story, as I understand it, with ~30 hours in. My impression so far is it's a good entry in the AC series, albeit not as good as Origins or Odyssey. I'm appreciating they went back to the "truer" swordplay mechanics of Unity instead of the button mashing of the past 2 games. I think the reduced gear drops is a step in the right direction: it seemed all you were doing at points in Odyssey was searching for and managing gear. The graphics are a step forward, especially the shadows. Main things I'm not enjoying: 1) the boat raids are a bore and not as fun as the fort/castle raids in previous ACs, 2) there's almost too much content, and making progress is far too slow going.
A word on the historical reconstruction.... The architectural history of 9th century England (or Norway) doesn't really lend itself to an AC game -- I said this before this game was released, and it's as I expected. When I think of Anglo Saxon architecture, I don't think of verticals: most of their buildings were only 2-3 stories tall max, and most in wood. Also, the Britanno-Roman ruins are at a scale and number that far exceeded anything that was there at the time. I can walk 2 minutes down the road to see one of the "villas" reconstructed in the game... it didn't look like that. More than any other AC title, they really diverged from reality and made everything much larger than it was. The style of the vikings is, not unexpectly, a victim of current times. They all look like extras off, at worst, Vikings and MCU Thor, at best the Last Kingdom -- more pop style than historical accuracy.
8/10
Caveat: I'm about 60% through the story, as I understand it, with ~30 hours in. My impression so far is it's a good entry in the AC series, albeit not as good as Origins or Odyssey. I'm appreciating they went back to the "truer" swordplay mechanics of Unity instead of the button mashing of the past 2 games. I think the reduced gear drops is a step in the right direction: it seemed all you were doing at points in Odyssey was searching for and managing gear. The graphics are a step forward, especially the shadows. Main things I'm not enjoying: 1) the boat raids are a bore and not as fun as the fort/castle raids in previous ACs, 2) there's almost too much content, and making progress is far too slow going.
A word on the historical reconstruction.... The architectural history of 9th century England (or Norway) doesn't really lend itself to an AC game -- I said this before this game was released, and it's as I expected. When I think of Anglo Saxon architecture, I don't think of verticals: most of their buildings were only 2-3 stories tall max, and most in wood. Also, the Britanno-Roman ruins are at a scale and number that far exceeded anything that was there at the time. I can walk 2 minutes down the road to see one of the "villas" reconstructed in the game... it didn't look like that. More than any other AC title, they really diverged from reality and made everything much larger than it was. The style of the vikings is, not unexpectly, a victim of current times. They all look like extras off, at worst, Vikings and MCU Thor, at best the Last Kingdom -- more pop style than historical accuracy.
8/10
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M76
[H]F Junkie
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
- Messages
- 14,035
I preferred the loot drops in Odyssey, the only thing I hated was the need to upgrade armor pieces. I hate the armor pieces being scattered around the map method of Valhalla, and no loot drops makes exploration kind of pointless, as you can't find anything useful anyway.
You are probably right about the architecture. But I think they made the right decision gameplay wise. It wouldn't be even less fun to raid historically accurate villas and forts.
You are probably right about the architecture. But I think they made the right decision gameplay wise. It wouldn't be even less fun to raid historically accurate villas and forts.
Furious_Styles
Supreme [H]ardness
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- Jan 16, 2013
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- 4,530
I went Typhon shield power and shotgun/glue as my first upgrades and just went toe to toe with most of them. It was fun blasting them right in the face.
Domingo
Fully [H]
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- Jul 30, 2004
- Messages
- 22,636
Deathloop (PC)
Graphics: 8. The game looks good, although it doesn't look amazing. When it launched there were stutter and performance issues galore, but those have mostly been fixed. Adding DLSS for Nvidia owners helped a lot, too (AMD always looked/worked fine). The thing is, for a game that intentionally doesn't have a lot of detail to objects, it needs some horsepower. Not sure that's justified and it looks like a game that would run fine on older hardware.
Sound: 9. The music, sound effects, dialogue, and acting are well done. Simple as that.
Gameplay: 7. You can play the game in a few different ways, but it never feels like it does anything particularly great. As a shooter it's pretty thin and as a stealth game you don't have enough tools. The game pushes you (aka. almost forces you) to approach certain levels certain ways, too. You have options, but eventually you kinda have to do things their way.
Overall: Deathloop is interesting because it's a shooter with only 4 maps. You have 4 times of the day you can visit those 4 maps. The goal of the game is to kill 7 bosses in a single day. The trick is, that's impossible without triggering a bunch of in-world events that make multiple bosses appear on certain maps. What that means is that you're going to have to go to those same maps over and over during different points of the day to unlock clues. Those clues will unlock events/doors that will eventually allow you to setup a "perfect" timeline when all 7 enemies can be killed. The good news is that the 4 maps are incredibly well done and dense with character, personality, and lore. The bad news is that there are still only 4 maps. You're going to get sick of them. I found simply approaching the different bosses and killing them sans a perfect run to actually be way more fun that the "perfect" run you setup in the end. By the time you get toward the end, you're going to be speedrunning everything because you're so tired of those maps. Occasionally you'll also be invaded by Julianna, who can be controlled by other players or the AI (depending on your settings). Those encounters are interesting and vary depending on your firepower and hers. You might be just starting and the invader has hundreds of kills, or you might be loaded with premium gear and the other player is in their first match. My experiences with it were all or nothing and I didn't care for the mechanic as a result. If you just make Julianna an AI, it's also a little hit and miss. Sometimes a single shotgun blast takes her out...but occasionally she seems to border on invincible. Having lots of turrets on your side and a powerful weapon tends to make most encounters trivial, though.
So, is Deathloop good? Yeah. I liked it in spite of its flaws. Arkane does a good job of giving their characters and worlds personality. Deathloop does that in spades. It's fun to explore once you learn how to manipulate the world. At least for me, there was a learning curve to how the world (and UI) works. Once I got things down pat, I had a fun time with it...until I started to get sick of it near the end. It probably isn't for everybody and I didn't enjoy it as much as I did the Dishonored games or Prey, but I'd still give it a solid score.
7.5 (maybe as high as 8.0 if I didn't have performance issues that took 6 weeks to resolve)
Graphics: 8. The game looks good, although it doesn't look amazing. When it launched there were stutter and performance issues galore, but those have mostly been fixed. Adding DLSS for Nvidia owners helped a lot, too (AMD always looked/worked fine). The thing is, for a game that intentionally doesn't have a lot of detail to objects, it needs some horsepower. Not sure that's justified and it looks like a game that would run fine on older hardware.
Sound: 9. The music, sound effects, dialogue, and acting are well done. Simple as that.
Gameplay: 7. You can play the game in a few different ways, but it never feels like it does anything particularly great. As a shooter it's pretty thin and as a stealth game you don't have enough tools. The game pushes you (aka. almost forces you) to approach certain levels certain ways, too. You have options, but eventually you kinda have to do things their way.
Overall: Deathloop is interesting because it's a shooter with only 4 maps. You have 4 times of the day you can visit those 4 maps. The goal of the game is to kill 7 bosses in a single day. The trick is, that's impossible without triggering a bunch of in-world events that make multiple bosses appear on certain maps. What that means is that you're going to have to go to those same maps over and over during different points of the day to unlock clues. Those clues will unlock events/doors that will eventually allow you to setup a "perfect" timeline when all 7 enemies can be killed. The good news is that the 4 maps are incredibly well done and dense with character, personality, and lore. The bad news is that there are still only 4 maps. You're going to get sick of them. I found simply approaching the different bosses and killing them sans a perfect run to actually be way more fun that the "perfect" run you setup in the end. By the time you get toward the end, you're going to be speedrunning everything because you're so tired of those maps. Occasionally you'll also be invaded by Julianna, who can be controlled by other players or the AI (depending on your settings). Those encounters are interesting and vary depending on your firepower and hers. You might be just starting and the invader has hundreds of kills, or you might be loaded with premium gear and the other player is in their first match. My experiences with it were all or nothing and I didn't care for the mechanic as a result. If you just make Julianna an AI, it's also a little hit and miss. Sometimes a single shotgun blast takes her out...but occasionally she seems to border on invincible. Having lots of turrets on your side and a powerful weapon tends to make most encounters trivial, though.
So, is Deathloop good? Yeah. I liked it in spite of its flaws. Arkane does a good job of giving their characters and worlds personality. Deathloop does that in spades. It's fun to explore once you learn how to manipulate the world. At least for me, there was a learning curve to how the world (and UI) works. Once I got things down pat, I had a fun time with it...until I started to get sick of it near the end. It probably isn't for everybody and I didn't enjoy it as much as I did the Dishonored games or Prey, but I'd still give it a solid score.
7.5 (maybe as high as 8.0 if I didn't have performance issues that took 6 weeks to resolve)
Furious_Styles
Supreme [H]ardness
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- 4,530
I think performance issues is one reason I rarely buy/play new games. I just did on Halo (due to gamepass) and had some weird performance issues as well that I'm sure will be fixed with the first major patch. Nothing game breaking, but certainly a minor annoyance that won't be there later.
Domingo
Fully [H]
- Joined
- Jul 30, 2004
- Messages
- 22,636
I definitely get that. I feel like there was a period where PC games were launching in an optimized state most of the time. That is NOT the case at the moment and it has probably been 3 years since it was. I do feel like most games tend to be in good shape after 2'ish months, though. With some luck, that's enough time for a sale to occur, too.
In the case of Deathloop, it was a mess on day 1. Almost unplayable on my setup (5800x + 3090). Lots and lots of jitter/stutter and performance issues. They patched the game a couple times in the first month, but it still wasn't quite right. They finally put out a "major" update 6-8 weeks after release that added a bunch of Nvidia features and fixed most of the stutter. Even now the game does have a weird visual "shake" to the world that I can't help but see when I'm looking for it. At a certain point you stop noticing or caring about it, but it's still there. It almost looks like a head bob effect, but that's even with that turned totally off.
Furious_Styles
Supreme [H]ardness
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Yeah with halo the nvidia low latency feature simply did not work. I would get weird lag/stutter at times with fps staying north of 100 fps the entire time. The cutscenes would also sometimes lag weirdly as if you were dropping to 30 fps. I recently played Prey and it ran great. Almost done with fallen order and it also looks and runs great.
scojer
[H]F Junkie
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2009
- Messages
- 10,002
Folklore
Folklore is an amazing game that takes place in a fictional town called Doolin, Ireland. You play as either Ellen, a girl who received a letter from her late mother to go back to this village to find her, or Keats, a paranormal investigator who receives a phone call asking for help. Ellen is there to find out what happened to her mother as well as uncover the secrets of her own childhood, which she has forgotten, and Keats is there out of pure curiosity. They both gain the ability to travel to different "Netherworlds" all based on our perception of the afterlife. There's realms that are nice and heaven like, such as the faery & underwater realms:
To hellish realms, like an Alice-in-Wonderland inspired purgatory like Endless Corridor, a war world, and Hell:
gameplay - 8/10 - The game is an action rpg, it is similar to Kingdom Hearts, it's you vs. a lot of "folks" - creatures from the Netherworld. You fight them and capture them, then use them in future battles, it's kinda like Pokemon, where you gotta catch them all, and use them against each other. The gameplay does become a little repetitive after a while, as most of the earlier creatures are reskins, only in the later half of the game do you get interesting looking ones that aren't simple reskins, aside from a couple.
graphics - 9/10 - This game is beautiful, it came out in 2007 and is a showcase as to what the PS3 is capable of. Whoever was in charge of art direction did an impeccable job.
audio - 8/10 - The audio is good, it does get a bit repetitive the soundtrack though is amazing, especially on the last level before the final boss battle. There is a violin track that I wish more of the soundtrack was like, but overall the soundtrack did not disappoint. Here's the violin track:
story - 8/10 - It would be higher but the game is told in comic-book style cutscenes and CGI cutscenes. Whoever was in charge of the CGI ones was a different writer, because there would be things that happened in the game, such as traveling to a Faery Realm, then the main character in one of the CGI scenes saying "Faerys, there's no such thing, is there?"
Aside from a couple of instances like that, the story is well crafted and ties together nicely at the end.
pros - Beautiful, fun, challenging at times, and a good overall story.
cons - Creatures are reskinned, lack of cohesion between in game cutscenes and pre-rendered cutscenes
TL;DR If you have a PS3 and haven't played this, find it and play it.
Folklore is an amazing game that takes place in a fictional town called Doolin, Ireland. You play as either Ellen, a girl who received a letter from her late mother to go back to this village to find her, or Keats, a paranormal investigator who receives a phone call asking for help. Ellen is there to find out what happened to her mother as well as uncover the secrets of her own childhood, which she has forgotten, and Keats is there out of pure curiosity. They both gain the ability to travel to different "Netherworlds" all based on our perception of the afterlife. There's realms that are nice and heaven like, such as the faery & underwater realms:
To hellish realms, like an Alice-in-Wonderland inspired purgatory like Endless Corridor, a war world, and Hell:
gameplay - 8/10 - The game is an action rpg, it is similar to Kingdom Hearts, it's you vs. a lot of "folks" - creatures from the Netherworld. You fight them and capture them, then use them in future battles, it's kinda like Pokemon, where you gotta catch them all, and use them against each other. The gameplay does become a little repetitive after a while, as most of the earlier creatures are reskins, only in the later half of the game do you get interesting looking ones that aren't simple reskins, aside from a couple.
graphics - 9/10 - This game is beautiful, it came out in 2007 and is a showcase as to what the PS3 is capable of. Whoever was in charge of art direction did an impeccable job.
audio - 8/10 - The audio is good, it does get a bit repetitive the soundtrack though is amazing, especially on the last level before the final boss battle. There is a violin track that I wish more of the soundtrack was like, but overall the soundtrack did not disappoint. Here's the violin track:
story - 8/10 - It would be higher but the game is told in comic-book style cutscenes and CGI cutscenes. Whoever was in charge of the CGI ones was a different writer, because there would be things that happened in the game, such as traveling to a Faery Realm, then the main character in one of the CGI scenes saying "Faerys, there's no such thing, is there?"
Aside from a couple of instances like that, the story is well crafted and ties together nicely at the end.
pros - Beautiful, fun, challenging at times, and a good overall story.
cons - Creatures are reskinned, lack of cohesion between in game cutscenes and pre-rendered cutscenes
TL;DR If you have a PS3 and haven't played this, find it and play it.
scojer
[H]F Junkie
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Resistance: Fall of Man is a first-person shooter set in an alternate history. Many of its gameplay features stem from this, most notably the weapons. Some weapons are based on real weapons circa the 1950s, while some weapons are futuristically altered in accordance with the game's storyline.
Gameplay - 7/10 - The gameplay was a clear rip off of Halo, with a lot of the enemies modeled very closely to the covenant. It's slow paced, but not too slow, and has some interesting weapons that are fun to use for a bit, but I found myself going back to the standard alien rifle, the "bullseye" - mainly because the ammo was plentiful. Overall the gameplay was nothing to write home about.
Graphics - 7/10 - The art style they were going for works, the golden color palette makes the game feel like an old war movie, and the aliens are pretty cool. The environments were good looking too, but the human characters when in cutscenes looked washed out.
Story - 7/10 - Around this time it seemed popular to turn the main character into a "super human" somehow. In F.E.A.R. the pointman was born with powers, in Quake 4 you became part Strogg, in this game, you become part chimera. So it was a trope at the time, but did explain auto healing, and the ability to become a bullet sponge (which the narrator brought up during a cutscene even.)
There is an Alien invasion in Europe and for some reason that doesn't make sense, America is staying out of the war, except for a small group of elite soldiers sent in. If there was an alien invasion, I think all countries would pitch in. You play as one of the American soldiers, get infected, and help stop the invasion by traveling all around Europe.
Audio - 7/10 - The audio was good, nothing special, the guns sounded good, the aliens had mostly unique sounds, and nothing repeated enough to be annoying.
Pros - Plenty of gunfire, gameplay is like Halo, if you like that you'll like this
Cons - Not a spectacular game, just a mediocre game overall.
I enjoyed all the resistance games. I really would like them to release HD remaster for them. Sadly it seems it is a dead series to Sony.
scojer
[H]F Junkie
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2009
- Messages
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I have the first two, I'm keeping an eye out for the third. Due to how mediocre the first one was though I'm taking a break until I play part 2. It wasn't a terrible game, just not great. After thinking on it more it's a hybrid of both Halo and Half-Life 2. Hopefully 2 and 3 are more fun and original.