Review the game you finished recently.

[Pivo504]

Finished Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice last night, purchased during summer sale.

Spectacular game. Wish I had played it sooner. Loved the combat and movement ability differences compared to Dark Souls and Bloodborne. The artistry of the locations/game world was absolutely amazing. Definitely among the best games I've played. Have very high hopes for Elden Ring now.

Was it really difficult game? I've been eyeing it but I just don't like playing games that are so difficult you want to break your controller lol

 

[ChoGGi]

It's like their other games.

 

[BeavermanA]

Was it really difficult game? I've been eyeing it but I just don't like playing games that are so difficult you want to break your controller lol

I don't think it would be crazy difficult for an experienced video game player, provided some of those games require good reaction speed. The first couple bosses were really kicking my ass until I learned how to move around compared to DS/BB. Last boss also took a lot of tries, but mostly due to my lack of patience. It's really just learning the pattern of enemies. Can always look up guides to get tips if needed, as the game is quite vague at guiding the player, which is typical of the developer.

If you never set a game on hard difficulty for a bit of a challenge tho, it may not be up your alley. I'm certainly more of a casual gamer these days, and that even factored in to my delaying of purchasing this game as it can be stressful trying to get through. Glad I did though, always feels good when you beat these types of games.

 

[Pivo504]

I don't think it would be crazy difficult for an experienced video game player, provided some of those games require good reaction speed. The first couple bosses were really kicking my ass until I learned how to move around compared to DS/BB. Last boss also took a lot of tries, but mostly due to my lack of patience. It's really just learning the pattern of enemies. Can always look up guides to get tips if needed, as the game is quite vague at guiding the player, which is typical of the developer.

If you never set a game on hard difficulty for a bit of a challenge tho, it may not be up your alley. I'm certainly more of a casual gamer these days, and that even factored in to my delaying of purchasing this game as it can be stressful trying to get through. Glad I did though, always feels good when you beat these types of games.

So it's like playing cup head lol I remember when I first played it I wanted to get a refund and couldn't understand why it was so highly rated. Then I just focused and started to get thru bosses and ended up loving the game lol. I've never played any of the dark souls games either

 

[BeavermanA]

So it's like playing cup head lol I remember when I first played it I wanted to get a refund and couldn't understand why it was so highly rated. Then I just focused and started to get thru bosses and ended up loving the game lol. I've never played any of the dark souls games either

Haven't played that, but I've seen vids. So yeah if you can get through Cuphead and enjoyed it, would imagine you'd like Sekiro. I'm not a rabid fan of this genre, but FromSoftware does some phenomenal work. The game worlds, level design and artwork are remarkable.

 

[biggles]

Rage 2 grade D, below average ("Rage 2 has stopped working")
A competent open world shooter with excellent shooting mechanics. Rage 2 has the dubious distinction of being THE BUGGIEST, MORE CRASHING GAME I HAVE PLAYED IN THE PAST 10 YEARS. Reminds me of Cryostasis in that regard. Cryostasis was legendary in its bugs.

Best part about the game is the shooting. Lots of interesting weapons with a solid punch. The powers mix in nicely to give a very fun action game. Using the jump in the air to punch the ground never gets old. The physics of enemies getting shot or blown up are really well done. Unfortunately, the rest is mediocre to above average. Characters and story are forgettable. The open world is not interesting. Driving is just okay, not bad. Actually, the indoor levels look much cooler and have a Halo feel to them. Music is good if you are into heavy guitar/hard rock. It fits the shooting action well.

If not for the extremely poor coding job, this would easily be a B game, above average. Remember the days of modifying .ini files to get games to startup? If you liked the old days of PC gaming where just getting the damn thing to run at all was an achievement then Rage 2 is for you. Game would not start on 2 of 3 PC's tested, turnoff vsync in the control panel, modify .ini files over and over again, testing different drivers. This one might be better on the console as I have not heard about all of these problems over there. By the way, both PC's with excessive crashing ran Ryzen cpu's. I did not test Rage 2 extensively on the Intel laptop, but it never crashed there. I do not recommend Rage 2 on the PC as it is a gamble whether you will ever get it to even startup. But if you got it for free like I did on Epic, there is some fun to be had if you are lucky enough to be able to run it.

 

[Pivo504]

Rage 2 grade D, below average ("Rage 2 has stopped working")
A competent open world shooter with excellent shooting mechanics. Rage 2 has the dubious distinction of being THE BUGGIEST, MORE CRASHING GAME I HAVE PLAYED IN THE PAST 10 YEARS. Reminds me of Cryostasis in that regard. Cryostasis was legendary in its bugs.

Best part about the game is the shooting. Lots of interesting weapons with a solid punch. The powers mix in nicely to give a very fun action game. Using the jump in the air to punch the ground never gets old. The physics of enemies getting shot or blown up are really well done. Unfortunately, the rest is mediocre to above average. Characters and story are forgettable. The open world is not interesting. Driving is just okay, not bad. Actually, the indoor levels look much cooler and have a Halo feel to them. Music is good if you are into heavy guitar/hard rock. It fits the shooting action well.

If not for the extremely poor coding job, this would easily be a B game, above average. Remember the days of modifying .ini files to get games to startup? If you liked the old days of PC gaming where just getting the damn thing to run at all was an achievement then Rage 2 is for you. Game would not start on 2 of 3 PC's tested, turnoff vsync in the control panel, modify .ini files over and over again, testing different drivers. This one might be better on the console as I have not heard about all of these problems over there. By the way, both PC's with excessive crashing ran Ryzen cpu's. I did not test Rage 2 extensively on the Intel laptop, but it never crashed there. I do not recommend Rage 2 on the PC as it is a gamble whether you will ever get it to such even startup. But if you got it for free like I did on Epic, there is some fun to be had if you are lucky enough to be able to run it.someone

Wow it's crazy how from one person to another there is such a difference how someone rates a game!

 

[Danny Dawg]

Finished Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2.

Plays pretty much like the first one which I found to be a good thing. (If you have not played either, I recommend getting both and play them back to back). Paid $40 for it and about 2 days in, a bonus region was released and unlocked via Steam which was cool. In this second one, they introduce long shot contracts. There are 3 of them if memory serves. I did not really like these long shots because you cannot play them the way you want. You have to snipe from way long range with no close up action. If you are a poor shot, or pick too hard a difficulty level and waste shots, you can run out of ammo and have to start the mission over. The ammo wells do not supply unlimited ammo. In the classical contracts, where you can play your own way, you can always pick ammo up off the dead NPCs and find other ways to complete the missions if need be. I thought the graphics were pretty good at 1080p. I did see a few cases where NPCs just suddenly appeared behind me out of nowhere and a couple places where the graphics just disappeared in front of me. It ran stable with no crashes.

The one thing they could improve on is the enemy dialogue. It got pretty old hearing the same voices and those same voices saying the same thing over and over.

 

[Domingo]

Assassin's Creed Valhalla

The 3rd in the latest arch of AC games, Valhalla is my least favorite of the newer games. It mimics most of the things that Odyssey and Origins did well and it retains the "Souls-like" gameplay-style. Yet the developers oddly decided to tweak the engine to add invisible barriers around all objects. What that means is that whenever Eivor (or an NPC of any sort) reach the edge of an object, they can't fall off of it unless they're in a jumping/free-falling state. You wouldn't think that would be a big deal, but it actually makes playing the game a struggle at times. It affects nearly everything you do, from climbing to combat. This change gives the whole game a bit of a "Eurojank" feel to it. You'll find yourself doing the wrong things constantly. Especially when trying to climb downward. In combat, you can no longer use the terrain to your advantage outside of a handful of attacks that put enemies into a free-fall state. It makes your interactions with the world never feel quite right.

The sheer size and scope of the game = nearly unmatched and if you do everything, you'll find roughly 150 hours worth of content to explore. That doesn't even count the DLC missions. It's up there with the Witcher 3, TES games, and MMO's in terms of content. I ended up doing roughly 90% of the side quests and whatnot and had enough at around 110 hours. A lot of that is me just wanting to be a completionist. A lot of the content in Valhalla simply isn't that fun. Some quests can be humorous and challenging, but most are repetitious to the point of being tedious. You'll explore visual glitch puzzles, a little bit of the Americas, and even head to Asgard...but are those things fun? I didn't think so. I found the Asgard missions particularly boring and tired. I found the raid missions to be fun and I still enjoyed the fights with the Order members, but those were few and far between and there aren't that many available. You also can't even begin to attempt most of them until you get relatively far into the game.

There are lots of different weapons and combinations you can use in combat, but most everything works the same. You basically just want to dodge (or parry on occasion) and return the favor with either an attack or special move. Combat is overly reliant on your level, which mimics some of Odyssey's approach. You can fight enemies well over your level, but there is rarely a point to it and you don't gain much (if anything) for trying. You are also only able to do damage using your special moves, which are a little spammy. Archery makes a return, but it seems weaker than in the last two games where it was a primary attack style. Here it's mostly a secondary approach.

The game isn't bad, but it's just disappointing after Odyssey, which might be the best AC game to date. Other than the size of the game (and some of the voice acting), I don't think it's better than Odyssey at anything.

Overall score: 7.0

 

[Choopyplz]

Finished Halo 3 for the first time today on the MCC. It's difficult to not compare it to the remaster of Halo 2 after having just completed that game prior to this one, but I think Halo 3 overall was a pretty decent game. Brutes are more annoying to fight, due to all wearing armor initially so that they require more shots to kill. On the flip side I thought the Flood were individually easier to handle, though the game does throw a whole mess of them at you through certain sections. I really enjoyed all of the vehicle stuff in the campaign! There seemed to be a big focus on presenting more vehicle-based missions and those were probably my favorite parts. There is a lot of backtracking in the campaign however, as in missions where you essentially go to the end, and then have to more or less run back to the beginning. I hadn't played this before on 360 so I don't know if that was one of the criticisms, but it was very apparent especially after playing Halo 2 where there is very little to no backtracking. The first mission or two are bad about it, and overall it made the map designs feel a bit lazy. Still a decently fun game -- the weapons all handle pretty well and the emphasis on vehicle portions helped to mix up the gameplay.

 

[Flogger23m]

Assassin's Creed Valhalla
The sheer size and scope of the game = nearly unmatched and if you do everything, you'll find roughly 150 hours worth of content to explore.

I thought I did a review on this one myself. You're right, this game is super long. Even Odyssey took around 75 or so hours when doing most of the side quests and visiting all the places. You could expand it to around 90 when doing all remaining sideqests and assassinating the listed people. This game took over 100. The "side quests" aren't side quests, they're parts of the story. I think it was far better than Odyssey, but more boring in terms of theme. But passable.

 

[M76]

Assassin's Creed Valhalla

The 3rd in the latest arch of AC games, Valhalla is my least favorite of the newer games. It mimics most of the things that Odyssey and Origins did well and it retains the "Souls-like" gameplay-style. Yet the developers oddly decided to tweak the engine to add invisible barriers around all objects. What that means is that whenever Eivor (or an NPC of any sort) reach the edge of an object, they can't fall off of it unless they're in a jumping/free-falling state. You wouldn't think that would be a big deal, but it actually makes playing the game a struggle at times. It affects nearly everything you do, from climbing to combat. This change gives the whole game a bit of a "Eurojank" feel to it. You'll find yourself doing the wrong things constantly. Especially when trying to climb downward. In combat, you can no longer use the terrain to your advantage outside of a handful of attacks that put enemies into a free-fall state. It makes your interactions with the world never feel quite right.

I have no idea what are you talking about, I never noticed that. The terrain is more flat than in odyssey so maybe that's why.

The sheer size and scope of the game = nearly unmatched and if you do everything, you'll find roughly 150 hours worth of content to explore. That doesn't even count the DLC missions. It's up there with the Witcher 3, TES games, and MMO's in terms of content. I ended up doing roughly 90% of the side quests and whatnot and had enough at around 110 hours. A lot of that is me just wanting to be a completionist. A lot of the content in Valhalla simply isn't that fun. Some quests can be humorous and challenging, but most are repetitious to the point of being tedious. You'll explore visual glitch puzzles, a little bit of the Americas, and even head to Asgard...but are those things fun? I didn't think so. I found the Asgard missions particularly boring and tired. I found the raid missions to be fun and I still enjoyed the fights with the Order members, but those were few and far between and there aren't that many available. You also can't even begin to attempt most of them until you get relatively far into the game.

Odyssey seemed far longer to me, and I've spent about 20 hours more finishing that, I think odyssey was less balanced trying to force "time savers" so it ended up longer than needed, having to spend too much time on grind.
Overall I think valhalla's content in general is more fun than odyssey. I agree about the asgard part however, after the initial shock it felt like a real drag.

 

[xDiVolatilX]

Last game I completed %100 was Batman Arkham Knight. It was amazing. I felt like I was in the comic books taking me back to my childhood. I highly recommend to any Batman fans to play the Arkham series. There is tons of story cut scenes in the games which really make it feel like the story telling in the comics.

I have now started Batman Arkham City & loving it. It is regarded as the best batman game & won game of the year also. Gonna be a while before I finish Arkham City GOTY because I dont play constantly or daily only when I'm in the mood. Took me a couple years lol

 

[xDiVolatilX]

I have no idea what are you talking about, I never noticed that. The terrain is more flat than in odyssey so maybe that's why.

Odyssey seemed far longer to me, and I've spent about 20 hours more finishing that, I think odyssey was less balanced trying to force "time savers" so it ended up longer than needed, having to spend too much time on grind.
Overall I think valhalla's content in general is more fun than odyssey. I agree about the asgard part however, after the initial shock it felt like a real drag.

I enjoyed playing Odyssey as the female hero, but the fighting system takes time to perfect & I didn't have the patience. I'm still at like 20% or so and feels like a huge map that I need to learn how to fast travel around also.

 

[harmattan]

I enjoyed playing Odyssey as the female hero, but the fighting system takes time to perfect & I didn't have the patience. I'm still at like 20% or so and feels like a huge map that I need to learn how to fast travel around also.

Both voice actors were superb in Odyssey, but the female voice actor was a step above. Best protag voice acting job in video games, IMO, since Mass Effect.

I haven't played Valhalla much, but by the accounts here, it sounds larger and longer than Odyssey, but with less heart and fun. I might pick it back up in a few months. At least I see they're going back to Paris for the DLC which should be interesting to see 800+ years earlier than Unity (which is the by far most underrated AC title).

For the time being, I'm on an Arkane Studios stint. Re-played Arx Fatalis and Dark Messiah, and now replaying Dishonored 1. Will likely do another run-thru of Dishonored 2 and D.O. before I'm done.

 

[Domingo]

I did everything there was to do in Odyssey (not counting the DLC) and finished in around 85 hours per Steam. With 110 hours of Valhalla, I did all of the "main" things (killed all the Order members, all of the mythical animals, and did all the river raids), but there were plenty of side quests I didn't do, boxes I never opened, and gear I never found. I barely touched the statue missions and blew through Asgard as quickly as I could. I don't even know what the hidden items in Asgard even do.
When it was all said and done I think I was level 375'ish. I completed all of the Raven and Bear trees along with 1/2 the Wolf tree. Maxing out all 3 would probably take a while since it's the story missions that give you most of your XP.

 

[biggles]

Sonic 4 episode 1: grade C (average). This game is practically the definition of a mixed bag. Best parts are the graphics, sound, and music. If you are nostalgic for Sonic 2d games it makes a great first impression. The more I played the game the less fun it was. The worst part about it is the physics. Previous Sonic games used momentum as a way to use running and jumping to proceed through the levels. In Sonic 4, you stop on a dime after releasing the directional controller. It is a terrible control decision. Another big problem is that the game will not even startup without installing Java. My understanding is the Java is a security risk in 2021, so proceed at your own risk. The final boss rush is pretty awful, you may want to quit before that because the prior levels are decent. Worst 2d Sonic game, but not a terrible game, just highly flawed.

Sonic Mania: grade A+ (excellent). Holy cow was this game is amazing! There are so many great adjectives one could use to describe it. Graphics are similar to the old Genesis games but with improved animation. Nice sprite scaling effects. Music is CD quality, and much of it remixes old favorites. The level design deserves special mention. They use small parts from the original games in some levels. This gives the player a sense of familiarity, but there are enough changes to keep it fresh and new. Plenty of things to unlock. Game is so fun I plan to actually play for 100%. This game is right up there with the all time greats like GTA 5, Mass Effect 2, Witcher 3. Everyone should play this game. Sonic fans especially will be blown away. Best 2d Sonic ever.

 

[Flogger23m]

Overall I think valhalla's content in general is more fun than odyssey. I agree about the asgard part however, after the initial shock it felt like a real drag.

That is because there is less side content. The problem is the story content in Valhalla feels like side content it self (iterative, lacking emotion and purpose). But it was okay enough to carry the game. I expected to be done with it in around 75 or so hours. Took over 100 and I still have many mystery quests to do but I don't intend on finishing those.

When all story DLC is out I'll consider playing through it.

 

[WarriorX]

Dragon Age 2

Found myself enjoying this one. Basically more Dragon Age. The characters, story and interactions with the game world made for a fun experience that I enjoyed all the way till the end. Always looked forward to the next quest and companion interactions. Some of the dialog between them was fun to wait and let them banter.

The RPG elements felt ok. Kinda annoyed at the dialog options doesn't match what the character actually says. For character progression, gear and abilities felt useful and strong. Never felt that I wasted any skill points in a useless ability.

Probably the complaint I had was the maps were reused often and the few hub zones was a disappointment. Would have liked to adventure to other towns, regions etc. Not sure if this is was due the time it was released( console or budget limitations?) I can't remember how varied the level design was for Origins but for this entry it felt weak.

Overall enjoyed the game. I might have to get the DLC and do another replay at some point and experience some of the quests I might have missed.

 

[harmattan]

Dragon Age 2

Found myself enjoying this one. Basically more Dragon Age. The characters, story and interactions with the game world made for a fun experience that I enjoyed all the way till the end. Always looked forward to the next quest and companion interactions. Some of the dialog between them was fun to wait and let them banter.

The RPG elements felt ok. Kinda annoyed at the dialog options doesn't match what the character actually says. For character progression, gear and abilities felt useful and strong. Never felt that I wasted any skill points in a useless ability.

Probably the complaint I had was the maps were reused often and the few hub zones was a disappointment. Would have liked to adventure to other towns, regions etc. Not sure if this is was due the time it was released( console or budget limitations?) I can't remember how varied the level design was for Origins but for this entry it felt weak.

Overall enjoyed the game. I might have to get the DLC and do another replay at some point and experience some of the quests I might have missed.

DA:2 got a bad wrap. It has a simplified gear and companion system, and like you said reuses a lot of assets and levels. However, I the story is solid, dialogue and VA excellent, and it maintains the feel of the original in most respects. Also, I believe it was the last title to have the best Bioware writers and designers, before they fled EA. Further, it was refreshing to have a localized story that dealt focused on characters and factions then the usual "save the universe" stuff.

The UI, however, was garbage.

 

[Aireoth]

DA:2 got a bad wrap. It has a simplified gear and companion system, and like you said reuses a lot of assets and levels. However, I the story is solid, dialogue and VA excellent, and it maintains the feel of the original in most respects. Also, I believe it was the last title to have the best Bioware writers and designers, before they fled EA. Further, it was refreshing to have a localized story that dealt focused on characters and factions then the usual "save the universe" stuff.

The UI, however, was garbage.

I disagree with maintaining the feel of the original, DA2 got a bad wrap because it completely broke with the look, touch, and feel of the original. The darkspawn modes where a huge step backward, as where most of the enemy models, they replaced the crpg tool bar with a XYAB combat model, they removed a vast majority of the character builds, enemy pop in was completely egregious and lazy, lack of maps and set peices due to massive reuse of areas. They literally pivotted from a traditional tactical crpg to a third person console based action rpg.

The only thing it had was VA and characters.

 

[Flogger23m]

Observer_

Ever want to play a game where you don't actually do anything, there is no plot, a bunch of blurry colored screens that change every three seconds, the main voice actor mutters every line so quietly that you can't understand a single word he says? I didn't think so. This "thing" isn't really a video game, but rather a shitty digital modern art gallery that flashes between your eyes. This is the digital counterpart to someone peeing on a canvas and hanging it up in an art gallery.

Gameplay wise, there isn't anything really. You press mouse 1 and clumsily fumble around trying to open cabinets with your mouse. I guess they haven't figured out most games allow a single key press. It works great. This game expects you to use your mouse like retarded kid scribbling with crayons. Opening a door is an utter hell and challenge in this game. In the absence of gameplay I suppose this was their idea of adding "interactivity". Aside from that the game is about using "eagle eyes", "eagle vision", or whatever you want to call it. There are three different versions of it to use, and switching between each one is an unnecessary pain. Bringing up your objective log takes a good 10-15 seconds in game. On top of that there is a cute gameplay mechanic which makes it illegible. The screen fades and tears, so you can't actually read it. Unless you press a button to pop a pill into your character's mouth every now and then. The game doesn't explain why the objective log requires your neanderthal character to pop pills to read his objective, but it gets annoying after the first time. The objective log itself doesn't even tell you what you're supposed to do half the time, or the context for anything. You stumble around from room to room, eagle eyeing everything, three times. You can't just quickly cycle through them of course.


The player is in a digital corn field? Despite cornfields and farming having absolutely nothing to do with the immediate plot at hand, it is somehow artistic. If you don't understand you're a dullard that can't appreciate modern art.

You're suddenly shoved into random series of exploding colors without context. It isn't scary or interesting in anyway. I have no idea what the hell they're trying to show or portray. Each scene changes within a few seconds so you can't even get a feel for your surroundings before it changes. Or even process why the hell a scene was included in the first place. This will be sprinkled with some dialogue that requires zero thought to process. Stuff like "this guy went to prison". And they drag it out for 15-45 minutes. We get the fucking point, why all the colors and entirely random things? Occasionally a monster will jump out, but you're so confused at what the fuck is going on screen that it can't even get a cheap scare in.


It sounds like the protagonist is a dying man, who recorded his lines as he was drowning while also using an old Logitech headset from 2001.

Story wise, it is set in a cyber punk setting. You are a detective. You then aimlessly stumble around rooms and colorful flashing screens. You were supposed to be looking for someone, but the game doesn't really make it clear what else is going on.

Audio wise the game is trash. Voices are too quiet, so enjoy constantly adjusting the volume. You can lower other sounds in the audio menu but I haven't found a proper value to equalize sounds. The voices are simply too quiet to hear. The main voice actor is fucking atrocious. He mumbles every line and is unintelligible. Famous quotes from the game includes "Mummramuhm, humdurdoomdumdum?"

Graphically the game looks okay. Some things look good, others subpar. But the game has a lot of stuttering and general performance issues.

There a bugs which can impede progress. These is no save system. The game will do checkpoint saves, but they're infrequent so a bug means you have to watch 5-10 minutes of flashing screens again when you restart.


This is a fan blowing on an open side panel PC case. Someone wasn't [H] enough and didn't plan their build with proper cooling in mind.

0/10​

I can't think of any reason to "play" this thing. I got it for free, and I wish I didn't spend 2-3 hours wondering why the objective log is illegible and why they hired someone who can't speak to voice the main character.

 

[biggles]

Yes, I played Observer as well and was not impressed. I would grade it a C, only recommended for people who really like this sort of game. The main character was voiced by the actor Rutger Hauer. Not a good fit for the role, he was much more impressive in film. Got my copy of the game free with Epic games.

 

[harmattan]

I disagree with maintaining the feel of the original, DA2 got a bad wrap because it completely broke with the look, touch, and feel of the original. The darkspawn modes where a huge step backward, as where most of the enemy models, they replaced the crpg tool bar with a XYAB combat model, they removed a vast majority of the character builds, enemy pop in was completely egregious and lazy, lack of maps and set peices due to massive reuse of areas. They literally pivotted from a traditional tactical crpg to a third person console based action rpg.

The only thing it had was VA and characters.

That's a fair assessment. It's been literally 7-8 years since I re-played DA2. I do recall the technical and design aspects of it being garbage, a harbinger of what EA would lead to in subsequent "RPG" offerings. The story and dialogue, however, made it worth the time.

On a related note, if you're looking for something in the vein of classic Bioware (detractions and all), check out Greedfall. A slog in places, but overall I had a blast.

 

[Aireoth]

That's a fair assessment. It's been literally 7-8 years since I re-played DA2. I do recall the technical and design aspects of it being garbage, a harbinger of what EA would lead to in subsequent "RPG" offerings. The story and dialogue, however, made it worth the time.

On a related note, if you're looking for something in the vein of classic Bioware (detractions and all), check out Greedfall. A slog in places, but overall I had a blast.

Greedfall is fun, little eurojank and lack of depth.

Playing through Solasta atm, finished my 4th playthrough of Deadfire and second of pathfinder last year. Classic isometric CRPG style games are one of my favorite genres.

 

[biggles]

Battlefield 1, Battlefield 4 (Campaign). Grade C (average).
It is said that you should not buy a Battlefield game for its single player campaign, the best stuff is in the muliplayer mode. This is indeed true. DO NOT BUY EITHER OF THESE BF GAMES FOR THE SP CAMPAIGN! They suck. Look great, though.

Battlefield 1 is supposed to be better than 4. Okay, slightly better, but not much. Game is still too dark. Lots of dumb design decisions, like telling the player to use binoculars WHEN YOU DO NOT HAVE ANY! I do like that in BF1 they have an onscreen icon showing if you are crouched or prone, 4 did not have that. Story is slightly better in 1. 4 had a bunch of clipping issues, 1 seemed to fix that. Both are very short games. I did like 4 better for showing the player weapon stats. Despite fond memories of Call of Duty Modern Warfare and COD2, BF games are not even close in terms of quality for the SP mode.

If all this sounds bad, let's save the best for last. Even in 2021, the Frostbite engine that runs the BF games is amazing. Graphics are terrific and framerates are high. A+ for looks. Sound effects also excellent. Playing on the PC it blows away the consoles, even if you have an older GPU like a 1050 ti. If someone at Dice/EA ever decides to really push hard for a SP mode with quality of the classic COD games then that will be fantastic for gamers. Until then, buyer beware, not intended for SP.

 

[M76]

DO NOT BUY EITHER OF THESE BF GAMES FOR THE SP CAMPAIGN! They suck. Look great, though.

I'd go as far to say they don't even look good. And this goes for BF1, BF4, BFV, all I've tried.

 

[Flogger23m]

I'd go as far to say they don't even look good. And this goes for BF1, BF4, BFV, all I've tried.

They certainly do look good for their respective release times. BF4's characters weren't as good as Crysis 3 and I suppose some other games released around the same time though. But considering the SP mode was more of a tack on that is expected. Things like lighting, explosions and environment detail are great. The ground and terrian detail in BF1/5 saw a big jump because they made heavy use of photogrammetry and most other games couldn't compare and still don't. DICE also used it in Battlefront 1/2, which also looked superb.

 

[M76]

They certainly do look good for their respective release times. BF4's characters weren't as good as Crysis 3 and I suppose some other games released around the same time though. But considering the SP mode was more of a tack on that is expected. Things like lighting, explosions and environment detail are great. The ground and terrian detail in BF1/5 saw a big jump because they made heavy use of photogrammetry and most other games couldn't compare and still don't. DICE also used it in Battlefront 1/2, which also looked superb.

Just because they used photogrammetry doesn't automatically make it look good. It just seemed like the same texture is repeated every 5 meters. BF4 might have looked good for its time I don't remember that, but BF1 and V, heck no.

 

[Flogger23m]

Just because they used photogrammetry doesn't automatically make it look good. It just seemed like the same texture is repeated every 5 meters. BF4 might have looked good for its time I don't remember that, but BF1 and V, heck no.

In general photogrammetry makes things look more unique and detailed which is largely the reason why it is used (easier to create a large variety of assets). That is how it looks in practically every game I've played that used it and it is generally the way the industry is moving for AAA games.

I've played Battlefront II and the terrian really does look this good in game:


I do think it looks better than most other games and looks less repetitive than most. BF5 isn't that different.

I don't have much screens of BF5 from my PC, but I do think this looks good in terms of general detail (model/texture/distance draw), lighting, reflections and smoke. This was compressed to jpg to upload and has an odd film grain thing going on. Not sure if that is a graphic setting, I hardly played the game because I don't like it. But I did think it looked good when it came out.

 

[OneofMillion]

Gta 2
I know it's an old game, but I have a huge fondness and never finished a whole before. The game is still playable, the music is atmospheric. The difficulty level is much higher than in modern GTAs
8/10

 

[ChoGGi]

GOURANGA!

 

[Flogger23m]

Chernobylite

If you're looking for something to scratch the itch for a STALKER like game, this is a decent substitute. Chernobylite is an FPS mixed with a base building game with minor rogue-like story design. Set in and around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the game is not just another post apocalyptic game set in a part of the former Soviet Union. It is directly inspired by STALKER, to the point the game calls people who traverse the zone Stalkers. But the game isn't just a low budget knock off, as it does offer a different gameplay template. Unfortunately it doesn't quite excel at anything it sets out to do.


If you played STALKER, you likely remember this real world hotel in Pripyat.

The game clearly didn't have a massive budget and sat in Early Access for a long time. While the game ended up being fairly polished you can absolutely see areas of the game that aren't developed as much as it could have been due to budgetary restraints. In some areas the game feels very well done, in others, oddly lacking.

Gameplay up front is fairly tedious. You will have to spend a lot of time collecting things like fuel, scrap metal, and mushrooms off the ground to build things at your base. This involves using a device to highlight junk on the map, which you will run towards and press F to pick up. It is as boring as it sounds. In turn, you use this junk to build machinery at your base. In turn you can build weapons, body armor, medical kits, accessories, and ammunition. Upfront this takes away from the experience. You're given little. A revolver, some basic tools and not much else. During the first few missions you will find yourself distracted from the experience as you run to every piece of junk littered on the map to collect. This is necessary to start building things. You cannot pick up guns from enemies, and finding them on the map typically requires you to build locks. After building the machinery to forge said item, of course.


Building up your base can be tedious and confusing in the beginning.

The machinery building GUI itself is a bit clumsy, as are some of the descriptions. Some of the machines left me wondering exactly what they do. One even required another machine to work properly. You'll have to manage things like building power generators and air purifiers to. Up front it is quite tedious and you'll spend a lot of time building up your base of operations, fumbling through the menu. Over the course of the game you'll build everything you need and ammunition will no longer be a problem. If you're into base building you'll love this game, if you find building plants to make your crew not leave you boring, you might find this to be a knock against the game.

Combat is clumsy. The animations for bringing up weapon sights is clumsy. Recoil, sounds and the like are not the greatest. I also find that weapons are too weak up front. Enemy NPCs are also underwhelming. They aren't very dynamic, intelligent, and largely play whack a mole at standard difficultly settings. They are deadly earlier in the game as you'll lack equipment to take them on. The game also features monsters/mutants, and they simply charge at you. I believe this is in part to certain game designs I will mention later, but it leaves a lot to be desired.


Thankfully the game has leaning. However, NPC soldiers seemingly cannot flank your position so once you get behind cover it is whack a mole time.


The setting and maps themselves are well done. The game features around 6-7 maps, which you will revisit over the course of many missions. There are story missions and then randomized (or limited set missions, I am not sure) set in the same maps. The size of the maps are not that large but they range from urban areas, to forests, with some underground areas. However each feels like a real area and the map detail itself is great. Atmospheric effects are also top notch, which make you feel like you're actually in Pripyat or the surrounding forests. Each map will contain multiple story missions and between side missions, you'll likely visit each map 4-5 times each and learn their layout.


The maps are not that big, but offer enough exploration and detail so that they don't get too repetitive by the time the story comes to an end.


The story itself is decent. Better than a lot of games, but not on par with the best gaming has to offer. The story offered enough intrigue to keep me going, and characters, motives and your goal are clear yet as the game progresses you realize things might be different from what you assumed from the onset. You'll get the illusion that there are twists and turns coming as you explore the world more and find more documents and have more conversations with characters.


The game references real world events, such as this battle between US forces and Russian contractors in Syria a few years back.


Player choice does affect how the game will play out. You must recruit companions, and story related decisions you make will lock you in or out of certain story missions, endings, and dialogue. Recruiting companions is a little harder than typical games as you must keep them satisfied. Keeping all characters you recruit satisfied is critical, although will prove problematic as each have different views on certain actions to make. You also have to weigh your decisions between what you think is right, wrong, and what can net you more information to completing your end game goal. In this aspect character management becomes more critical and harder to balance than games like Mass Effect. If you make a character dissatisfied, they will leave your group locking you out of ending options and story missions.


Player choice matters for the ending, and you can choose different characters for different roles much like Mass Effect 2.


However, the game does allow you to alter your timeline should the player die. If you die in combat, during the final mission, or from radiation poisoning you will have a chance to revise your time line. This will let you forget memories, so you can try recruiting a character you missed, or revise memories for a different choice. This will of course effect future actions and character trust levels. You will likely die a few times, or want to go back and redo an aspect of your timeline. It is confusing at first but becomes simply once you figure out how it works.

Graphically the game can look great to average. Some assets look wonderful, like building interiors, lighting and map design. Character animations are lacking though. Likewise, guns look underwhelming and have odd colorful patterns on them which don't seem to fit the setting. Performance wise the game runs good, with some occasional stutter.


The game can look great. Props to the environment artists.

Sound wise the sound track gets the job done but isn't particularly memorable. Weapon sounds are not that great. Other ambient sounds are video game average. Voice acting is fine, although most people have some type of British or American accent. Which sounds odd given that most characters are Russian or Ukrainian. It was hard for me to overcome in the game initially.


7.2 / 10

Overall the game is worth trying. It is a decent game, and had the potential to be so much better if the budget was larger and things were better explained to the player.

 

[biggles]

Battlefield V. Grade D (below average). Single player only reviewed.

Question, can EA publish a Battlefield game even worse than BF1 and BF4? Answer, yes indeed they can! Wow is this game a mess. Bad, bad level design. SJW storyline with unlikeable characters. Stupid gameplay decisions. Examples, characters speaking in a foreign language sounds cool except that you cannot understand what they are saying during action scenes. It is not like you can read captions translating to english when gunfire is all around you. This Battlefield also has a nasty habit of ending the game with a 10 second countdown if you go outside the correct area. So, at one point I was ordered to destroy 3 big guns. But I tried to go after gun 1, then 3, then 2. But you must go gun 1,2,3 in that order. Why? Because EA says so, and everyone must obey EA or else game over! There is a lot to dislike here. Worth mentioning is that amateur gamer reviewers are most credible here with the negative reviews, as many of the pro game review sites or youtube channels seem to have overrated BFV.

On the plus side, when the game is loading up it lights up the correct keys to show a letter "V" on my Logitech G810 keyboard, yay! And I still love the Frostbite engine. Graphics, explosions, smoke, etc look great and run at a high framerate on any reasonable hardware. Good thing I got these BF games free with Amazon prime. I would have been pissed if they had cost anything more than a dollar.

 

[Domingo]

Control

Full disclosure, this was a freebie in the Epic store, although I did consider buying it last fall. My wife bought it and said she lost interest pretty quickly...but her gaming tastes tend to be less eclectic than mine.

Overview: Anyway, Control seems like a great game on the surface. You have a supernatural game based on real-world paranormal legends from a good developer. Gameplay is like a mix of Alan Wake, Half-Life 2, and even has some Metroid-Vania elements. I like all of those things. Sounds like a surefire great game, right? Kinda? For me, the game just never really got going. You're mostly wandering around a giant empty office building and fighting occasional waves of soldier-like enemies.

Gameplay: Combat is a mix of gunplay (there are 5 gun variations) and HL2-style gravity attacks. You get access to other powers like a shield, flying, and the ability to posses enemies, but they come pretty late in the game. For 2/3 of the game I found myself alternating gunfire and throwing objects to let both re-charge. The different guns were a good idea, but I found certain versions to be underpowered while others felt almost too good. Oddly, some of the better ones also gave me a faster path to upgrading them, too. That made the differences even more stark. Ditto with power-ups. Some are simply straight-up better than others. Enemies respawn on occasion, but it seems to be entirely randomized. The game gives you side missions involving defeating certain enemies in certain ways, which makes this frustrating. "I would if I could" became my mantra for most of those missions.

Plot: I won't spoil the story, but that's a definite highlight. I found the plot engaging and it pushed me to keep playing. It's mostly told via a bunch of written documents (and the occasional audio/video blurb) scattered throughout the environment. It works well and is probably the best thing about the game.

Graphics: Graphics are good, no more no less. A lot was made of the game being a ray-tracing showcase, but it's barely noticeable most of the time. You really only see lighting effects in a few areas. Most of the time the game looks (intentionally) hazy and a little washed out, or dark and sparsely lit. That's with everything cranked to the max on a 3090. The real graphical highlight is the physics, though. All of the objects you can grab/throw look very cool and move in a natural way. I wish they did more than just let you throw them, though.

Sound: The sound is fantastic. Creepy voices coming from all sides/angles, great positional audio, solid acting, and a good musical score were highlights.

Etc. A majorly weird quirk is that the game is roughly 70% empty. You're basically wandering around an office building looking for the little icons that reveal either a file to read or a power-up. The game tries to highlight every single object you can grab needlessly, which makes seeing the interact icon a needle in a haystack. The thing is, there's no real point to highlighting objects. Pressing the gravity/grab button will snag whatever is close to you automatically. That even includes pieces of the building if there isn't anything else available. Short of the rare explosive object, they all do the same damage, too. Basically there's zero reason to highlight grabbable stuff. What about grabbing objects to look for hidden paths or objects? There are only a handful of instances of this in the entire game, and they're very late. It feels like something they might have planned to do more with, but never did.

Overall: The game isn't super long and a good chunk of the length is has is due to me looking for files to read. Either that or backtracking and hoping for enemy respawns. Early on, the game has an epic size/scope vibe, but after a few hours you start to realize that it's probably not that big or that long. There isn't a ton of variety, either. I just kept pushing forward to see where the plot was going. Toward the end I found myself ignoring collection-based side quests and just pushed forward.

When I think about Control, I think about a game that had so many great things on paper and just didn't execute them well. It's a long way from being bad, but it's also a long way from being particularly good.

6.5

 

[biggles]

Great review of Control, Domingo. Cannot complain as I got it free on Epic as well. It is a good test of my new gaming laptop 3070. Game is overrated, confusing, and the graphics do not seem to be as great as other reviews had said. For instance, Battlefield graphics look better to my eye. Maybe Control is doing something better on a technical level, I do not know, can only say how it seems to look vs other games. Anyway, a 6.5 is quite fair, much lower than the 8s and 9s I saw the pro reviewers giving it.

 

[Domingo]

Great review of Control, Domingo. Cannot complain as I got it free on Epic as well. It is a good test of my new gaming laptop 3070. Game is overrated, confusing, and the graphics do not seem to be as great as other reviews had said. For instance, Battlefield graphics look better to my eye. Maybe Control is doing something better on a technical level, I do not know, can only say how it seems to look vs other games. Anyway, a 6.5 is quite fair, much lower than the 8s and 9s I saw the pro reviewers giving it.

I think it's easy to see all of the things that should be great about Control and think it's better than it is. For all of its flaws, I liked Alan Wake a lot more.

 

[WarriorX]

Just Cause 3

A fun game that had some flaws from making it a total joyride

The mission structure is pretty repetitive and there wasn't much variety. Destroy this, defend the NPC, deliver this vehicle. For the most part this was fine however the defend the NPC missions were a nightmare. The AI charge into the enemy and die because their health is low causing a restart of the mission. Why must game developers continue to use this poor mission design. Also the AI have auto aim and never miss causing you to die in mid flight. Guess they had to introduce some sort of difficulty.

Destroying outposts was the highlight of the game. However this is another example of more is not better. A lot of the outposts are copies of each other. I think fewer but more thought out bases would have been better instead of seeing an outpost with a similar layout as the last 10 outposts. The larger outposts were a delight to destroy everything in.

Weapon variety. The game has a fair amount of weapons but some of them are outclassed by others. I used the same few weapons that I had at the start the entire game. Once you get the DLC weapon, it was the only weapon I used.

Overall the game was a decent experience and was fun causing carnage, only brought down somewhat by the disappointing aspects of the game.

 

[Flogger23m]

Mafia 2: Definitive Edition

There is nothing good about this game. The car mechanics are awful. Sometimes your car will randomly keep going in the direction it was last moving in. Why? I have no idea. The driving physics aren't realistic in the slightest, even on simulation mode. Cars will randomly jut out in the opposite direction, skidding all over the place like when you run over a bananna peel in Mario Kart. When you're going from 0 to 15 MPH. Driving is also a hell because NPCs will kamikaze into you for no apparent reason. At high speeds they'll just decide to turn into you and instantly kill you. I don't think the developers had much experience with driving cars at all. You'd think they'd hire someone with some remedial driving experience. The camera is also atrocious. It decides to zip around the screen and isn't centered. This means when turning you need you adjust your camera when driving. Awful idea. You turn around a corner, the camera decides to lower the focus on your lower left wheel so you can't see where you're driving.

Building onto the NPCs, the police system makes zero sense. They can magically see through buildings and have telepathic powers to detect who you are apparently. They will also go on a murderous rampage with Thompson SMGs is you so happen to go 5 MPH over the speed limit (while other NPCs vehicles are driving faster than you). If an NPC kamikazes into you, they will radio "hit and run", and decide to gun you down. Which makes zero logical sense since you are the victim, and a hit and run requires you to actually run from the accident. On the other hand, if you're chased by cars full of gunmen shooting like maniacs the police will conveniently ignore them.



What the hell is this supposed to be? 2K Czech's idea of aiming your weapon. Absolutely unacceptable for a game made in the past 15 years. Some of the worst shooting gameplay ever.

Aside from being a horrific driving game, this is also a "shooter". It is a 3rd person shooter, which means it ranges from bad to horrific. This game falls into the horrific category. The shooting mechanics and attention to detail are rock bottom. Slides don't lock back on pistols. Aiming mechanics make zero sense. Aiming includes a horrific zoom, which means you can't see your surroundings. It also makes aiming at someone rounding a corner impossible. It is also a cover based shooter, which means using a terrible "cover" mechanic, which doesn't work well at all. It isn't fluid. Enemy NPCs are morons, the only way they kill you is with instant head shots and running up to you as you're stuck to a wall unable to fire back due to the horrific zoom. For a game from 2010, the shooting and combat is utterly terrible. It plays more like something from the 1990s. Mods from the early 2000s blow this game out of the water.


The face of retardation. I'm assuming most of the developers who worked on this pile of shit looked as retarded and inbred as the protagonist.

Basic interactions are very clumsy. Opening cars doors, character movement stutters and stammers, switching weapons. Everything you do to interact with something is absolute shit.

There is no save system in this game. So when the game CTDs (once ever hour or so), it is repeating the same crap again for 30 minutes. The checkpoint system is also horrific, which is infrequent. You start a mission, a save icon appears. The game crashes, you find out that icon meant nothing and you restart from the top.

In the world, most of the people have the same faces. So you'll see 4-6 people standing together with the same face.

The GUI sucks, it constantly pops up and tells you to make an account for some shitty publisher. Every time you open the menu. Want to check graphic settings? BAM! "Please sign up to our shitty service!" assholes, I already own the game. What more do you want?

Performance drops when the shooting starts to the 30-40 frame rate range, maybe worse. Makes it hard to play. There are random stutters throughout the game. There is also bad pop in and draw distance. Even for a 2010 game. Sometimes you can't interact with things, other times the gun shot sounds become mute.

Sounds suck.

The story is mundane, and has zero emotion. Or logical thought process. It just happens. Your character is seemingly a retard who cannot learn or reflect on his experiences. Allegiances shift so quickly I can't even recall who is who. Likewise, the ending is absolutely abrupt. It seems like they lopped off the end entirely. A major plot development occurs in the last minute and the screen just fades black and the credits roll. No reaction. No reflection. Just "here is a big plot change that actually matters, but let us end the game right now". The game has a buying system, but every 2-3 missions it soft reboots and you loose everything so it is pointless.

The DLC is utter trash. Don't even bother. It is the worst part of the experience, and I won't bother with the other two.

CTDs are present, so if you like those, have fun.

The only good thing about this abomination is there are no side missions in the main game.

2/10

Fucking pathetic. If these guys want to make another game, take a driving course and maybewatch a Youtube a firearm video first. Everything about this game screams "we're lazy and incompetent".

 

[M76]

Terminator: Resistance /2019/

What do IGN, Eurogamer, Destructoid, VG247, Rock Paper Shotgun, and most other mainstream gaming sites have in common? They all said this game is terrible, and they are all full of it. Not that I gave any credibility to their reviews in a very long time, I'm just demonstrating a point. And that point is that the mainstream media has lost contact with the actual gaming community they no longer represent gamers, they represent twitter and progressive sensibilities.

And boy this game, was not made to pander to any sensibility. Even I was shocked at some of the things they actually put in the game. Probably the only reason it didn't get cancelled is that it is too small fry and remained under the radar. And the above mentioned idiots probably skipped all side missions if they even finished the game, so they didn't get to see the non PC conforming bits.

That said, what is the game like? Remember Terminator Future Shock or Skynet? Yeah the 1995 / 1996 Terminator FPS games developed by none other than Bethesda. I don't blame you if you don't, they are quite old and obscure games, but I loved them. The future war with the machines is the most ripe theme from the franchise for videogame adaptation, as it is virtually unsullied territory, well except for terminator salvation, but wisely the game, disregards every movie after Judgement Day as if they never happened. Proof that it was made by real terminator fans. But I digress, Resistance is Metro Exodus meets Future Shock.

You start off as a resistance soldier on the run whose whole unit was wiped out by an infiltrator, and stumble upon a ragtag group of survivors / scavengers. You help them and in turn they take you in and you go on the road together. If you played Metro Exodus this must sound familiar. I don't want to spoil the story, but it was far more enjoyable to me than Metro Exodus ever was. It's not an epic twisting masterpiece but it is good enough to keep you guessing what are the right choices at each point. Yes there are several important choices you can make that will affect the tone of the ending if not the outcome.

Gameplay wise the game offers RPG elements like crafting, trading, inventory management, and skill upgrades. There are mini games for lockpicking and hacking. The lockpicking mini game is the good old well tested method, if it works don't change it, unless you are Kojima and you like to change things for the sake of it. The hacking minigame is one of the best I've seen. It's just challenging enough to keep you on your toes but not frustrate you. The concept is basically frogger but if it works it works.

Combat wise there is clear progression. First you only have regular firearms and only encounter weaker scout robots. But then when the first T800s and its derivatives start to appear you are forced to switch to stealth as regular weapons don't do anything against those. You can try your luck with crafted pipebombs, but you'll soon realize that skynet has more terminators than you pipebombs. Later you'll get plasma weapons that can actually kill terminators, but the stronger ones like the T825s are still easier snuck around than taken down. You can even stealth take down terminators using a consumable tool called termination knife. This is basically a regular knife with some electronics attached to it that fries the terminator when lodged into its neck from behind.

But probably the most rewarding thing in the game is hacking turrets and turning them on the enemies. Of course first you need to sneak close enough to be able to hack them without being detected. But there is nothing more satisfying than watching your turret make minced metal? from half dozen terminators, while you just stand back and maybe do a few assist shots. Don't worry, the kills still counts to your XP even if the turret kills enemies.

If you thought terminators will be the biggest enemies you face, think again, there will by bigger fries too, and in total there are at least a dozen different enemy types. And it's not just this in the early game and that later, the good old friends keep appearing until the end of the game, even if by then you can basically one shot a T800.

But no game is without its faults and this is no exception. That said the issues are more balance related than technical. The game has surprisingly few bugs considering how small was the team that made it. I think I saw maybe 3 programmers and 5 testers in the credits? Either way it was the shortest credits list I saw in a long time. The crafting and trading in the game becomes redundant very quickly so crafting and trading material just becomes dead weight. For the first few levels it was life or death that I could craft new ammo or a few medkits, but later you get enough of everything that you can forget this part completely. There are several personal missions you can undertake for various characters, and these are blatantly marked in the conversation options, like they thought the player completely stupid. Or perhaps they anticipated journos, but those still haven't managed to do these "loyalty" missions.

Speaking of. Completing loyalty missions determine whether you can influence characters later in the game to do as you wish. If they don't trust you they'll do as they please for better or worse. And there are romance options as well, which is also based on their trust level.

Spoiler

You can even be the flag bearer of toxic masculinity. And bed both LIs in one single game without any of them being the wiser

But circling back to the game's issues, one is that some of the characters have creepy unblinking eyes during some conversations. It's uncanny valley stuff. But otherwise the characters look decent, certainly better than I'd expect from such a small studio. They seem to have paid extra attention to the potential LIs, because their models are quite attractive, none of this modern day feminist BS making characters deliberately ugly, just to spite men.

Before we start listing the pros and cons I have to touch on infiltrator mode, which is a bonus game mode where you can play as a terminator, this is a permadeath mode you need to complete it in one go. You have to collect intel on a medium sized open map to locate your target and then eliminate him. Easier said than done, the life of an infiltrator is not as easy as it seems, your health doesn't regen and repair kits are rare on the map. So there were a few times when I had to run steel tail between my robotic legs from those pesky humans to effect some repairs before trying their bunker again. It's a cool distraction and can be finished in about 45 minutes. Unless you fail on your first try.

Let's list the pros and cons

+

• Relatively good graphics
• Atmospheric maps
• Until you get OP purple plasma weapons encountering terminators can get very tense
• Great skill and gameplay progression
• True to the first two films and throws away the garbage
• Soundtrack is pretty good, with some original music and remixes from the movies
• Shooting is satisfying there is clear audible feedback on hits
• Decent storyline
• Choices matter
• Excellent hacking minigame
• As you learn more about the characters they become more likeable even those who seem like aholes at first

-

• Crafting and trading becomes useless later in the game
• Creepy wide open NPC eyes
• Game gets easier for the second half, not harder
• Enemy AI is quite...robotic, but at least here that makes sense, you can say these are not the advanced units
• Time travel never makes sense, it's a self defeating paradox so you need extra suspension of disbelief
• Non character specific side missions only purpose is to get more XP and loot, there is no other benefit to doing them
• Maps are quite small, more like corridors with some semi open areas

Overall I really liked the game, it is much better than it has any right to be.

Graphics/Realization: 7/10
Story/Atmoshpere: 8/10
Gameplay/Controls: 10/10
Overall impression: 8/10