ELEX

I feel bad for not liking this game, I have actually a few days off work so I could enjoy it. That only makes it more dissapointing, but is not the source of the score for the game. My major issues with the game are such: 1. The big one: Combat. Piranha Bytes games always had clunky combat, it's basically an endearing, if infuriating stable. But this game takes it a step further - it has the same clunky melee combat as always, but added a Stamina meter which runs out after 3-4 swings and is used for blocking as well. So not only is it difficult to actually hit an enemy, you have to disengage and wait for it to refill. Even if the enemy is on the ground, begging to be skewered. Ranged combat is equally ridiculous, as many enemies (including animals/mutants) have ranged attacks anyway, shooting strictly requires aiming (no auto-aim or hip fireing), which in turn restricts movement and leaves you vulnerable for melee. I could forgive the combat if the rest of the game was interesting, but: 2. The factions are functionally identical. Unlike previous Piranha games from Gothic 2 on, where you always had 3 factions that varied in gameplay: Melee, Mixed and Magic (ranged), the factions here give you very similar capabilities. All of them give you comparable Melee, comparable Ranged and comparable Magic (or chems). Unfortunately, all of them are utterly unlikable. Nature Zealots, Religious Tech Zealots and Criminal Zealots. You're not even given a compelling reason to join. You don't need their support or anything. Just equipment. That's literally the "quest" reason the game gives you. The rest of the game, while not infuriating, is rather dissapointing. The Domed City is a minor footnote and nothing in it matters to the rest of the game. The plot is uninspired ("you want revenge for some reason"). Jax comments about "turmoil because of regaining emotions" but you'll be straining to notice how it matters. There's good ideas in the game, but they're wasted in practice.

The quest log is a mess. Gothic 1+2 were much more intuitive. The inventory is a mess. Yes, worse than Gothic 1+2 and those were not exactly good. I enter the first town and in the initial dialogs already get stat check options that are well above my current level. Some of these options disappear forever. Is that supposed to be replayability? NPCs hand out quests leading to overleveled enemies. Why would they even bother giving instructions to a nobody? It would make more sense I had to progress a bit in whatever faction just to build some sort of reputation. For most quests, it is hard to tell whether I am prepared or not; the only way to tell is to walk there. Monster spawns are seemingly random. The rule in Gothic 1+2 was that you encountered stronger monsters when straying further from roads. Not anymore. The map is too large for the amount of content. 90% of the NPCs in this game have nothing to say. I enter a tavern and cannot talk to anyone except the barkeeper. Going from one of the few talking NPCs to the closest other talking NPC might take 30 s. In a town, mind you. Try that in Khorinis. Gothic 2 came with a nice manual that explained combat a bit, in addition to lists of commonly encountered enemies, weapons and armor. How is damage calculated in ELEX? How much of an experience bonus do I get the skill that grants more XP for quests? There is no manual and the ingame descriptions are extremely vague. Weapons in Gothic had some sense of progression (in the first half of the game at least); there was always a better weapon to be had with just slightly higher stat requirements. Now the average trader does not sell more than 2 weapons, both of which require dedicated stat investment for 10 levels straight to equip. Most importantly: The factions are all batshit crazy! I feel like the world would be better off if I wiped out all factions. I could relate (more or less) to all factions in Gothic. In ELEX, none. Even the PC deserves no sympathy.

True Open World -check Cool Factions -check Taking out high-level monsters at low level -check rewarding exploration -check jetpack -check rewarding gameplay -check Must Buy for Gothic 1+2 lovers

The game COULD be a masterpiece. The world is really beautiful to explore, a great open world, the blending of fantasy and sci-fi amazes me. BUT then you play it. Aside for some hope-excusable plot holes (i haven't finished the whole game, so maybe they would be filled later), what is really terrible it's the User Interface and the Combat System. The UI it's really lacking, and i'm literal: it lacks some values. For example you don't know how many health points you have (no number anywhere), while you know how many you heal...nonsense. There are some abilities with a level, but nowhere you can see which level you are on them...unless you sign the value on a paper character sheet whene they increase like an old good pen-and-paper RPG, which i love, but it's not what i want from a videogame. The combat system it's really awful, dull at it's best. It combine the worst part of a real time combat (which usually i love) with a sort of slow-and-farraginous combo system combat. I can't describe it, you should try it. Maybe you could think that i'm the one who doesn't understand fully the combat system, but believe me, i have played many games, and rarely (no - never) i've seen something so unnatural and "woody". Someone on the internet says that all the Piranha Bytes games have a particular combat system, one of a "you love it / you hate it" type. I really hate it, and you can't avoid all combat, so this (combat system) REALLY ruins the game for me. Conclusion: not a "€ 50 value" game to me. Wait for a year or so, and if you are a fan to the genre, pay it € 20 or less, and you could enjoy it a little. If i could go back in time, i would never had bought it.

The good: -if you liked Gothic, you will love this one - it has all the charm of the series -the character development system - you have the basic attributes like strength, cunning etc which raise your abilities a bit and are keys to unlocking perks; then you have perks which are your bread and butter of character building - here you can find your +dmg skills, pickpocketing, spells, class abilities etc. A nice touch is that some dialogue options require you to have a number of perks in a certain category to use them, but they never require a specific one, meaning there's no one "diplomacy" skill that affects conversations only -the world - it's created beautifully. The graphics are pretty, the lore is interesting, the clash between nature and technology as well as logic and emotions is thematically everywhere -gray morality - you don't split choices into good and bad. Many a time you are required to choose which moral value is more important to you instead of just going the "hero" route or "villain" one The bad: -the game lacks TONS of basic or QoL features. How am I supposed to know whether a potion is good or bad, when I don't have the access to numerical values of my HP and mana?! -the combat could use a bit more polish. The lock on system can mess you up big time, I made tons of evades I never meant to do, the mechanics like knockback are left unexplained and unclear. Sometimes I can kill an enemy without taking any damage, sometimes they just refuse to stagger from my hits letting them get free combos on me -the Polish localisation is very low quality. Many words seem to have been translated without the translator knowing the context. You can see stuff like "coefficient" in the place of "value", "screen mode" in the place of "sit down", or having more than one name for a single thing. One NPC even introduces herself as "Ania" while the subtitles say "Annie". Verdict - it's a nice game that needs some patches to become great one.