The Hand of Merlin

The game is a nice mix of 'choose your own adventure' gamebook's style (story progression), RPG (characters progression and combat), and roguelite (few or more runs needed to unlock new heroes, spells & skills, and achievements). The core of the game is the isometric tactical Turn-Based Combat with eye-pleasing graphics, a fairly clear graphical interface, and with interesting combat rules, and sufficiently diversified opponents, although the AI ​​controlling them does not pose too difficult challenges to the player. The game world is a chivalric Middle Ages, modeled on the history of Charlemagne's wars, Andalusia under Muslim rule and the Crusades, with a leading motif of references to Arthurian legends.

Despite the diligence of the developers, some things in the game are confusing and certainly not intuitive.

1. Although the game's GUI suggests that when creating a team you choose one character from each class, any combinations are possible (even 3 characters from one class).

2. Description of the achievement "killing three enemies in the same round" to unlock hero is not clear, rather confusing, cause you need to do this with just 1 of your characters.

3. Gaining access to new Cores requires completing tasks that are unknown to the player and will undoubtedly require at least a few runs. If you prefer to know more, you will find clear tips by reading the list of Achievements (available in the game menu).

Full list here.

A couple that I finish a few weeks back:

Hollow Knight

What will likely come as no surprise to those who have played it - what a great game and an amazing experience. Exploring Hallownest was a lot of fun and had a great atmosphere along with an incredible soundtrack. I got stuck on a few bosses but usually was able to go away and do something else before trying again. I only did the base ending for now so I still have more to look forward to!

Tomb Raider (2013)

This one was a bit more hit and miss. The setting was ok and general traversal was fun. Combat was reasonably enjoyable although sometimes it felt like there was too much. I would have liked if the optional tombs were a bit longer. My main gripe was the amount of times Lara would get a major injury with little to no consequences or the amount of explosion filled running/jumping segments. Overall I did largely enjoy the playthrough but I was also glad to see it end as I found it fairly average overall.

Eiyuden Chronicle Hundred Heroes, May 22 (Xbox Game Pass)-I wanted to try it internet warriors be damned. It turned out kinda ok. Story was cliche but serviceable. Voice acting was pretty good with a few exceptions. There were some bad mini games thrown in. Combat was easily the worst part. It lacked depth and it was faster and easier to just auto combat thru 90% of the game. 100+ heroes/playable characters makes it difficult to get attached to any of them and they just turn into walking stats. If this game and mechanics are any indication of the quality of the Suikoden series, then I can't imagine liking any of those very much either.

Full List

After upgrading firstly CPU to R7 7800X3D and now GPU to RX 9070, I decided to buy a play Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition. Since I installed version 2.21 I do not care about bad launch and describe today state. After playing The Witcher 3 in past, I was surprised by launcher. Such thing is annoying, so I had to create my own link to avoid it in future. Started with setting best graphics possible ended without RT with all to maximum detail with one exception (and some picture distorting options). Cyberpunk 2077 is even today extremely demanding in 4K resolution. After game started, I must say that authors have great aesthetic feeling, first bar was very impressive, material has great textures, especially clothes on human. Level of details is something absolutely outstanding. So I was shocked by many different situation when textures were comparable with Duke Nukem 3D. Another important things, is that as some others I would not be able finish tutorial, because game tells you to do something else, than what is expected.

Interesting is, that Cyberpunk tries to bring some new elements into the genre. I really love how they balanced game and now is not necessary take all things which are possible. Game plays very well if you take just small amount of items in general and thus you do not need wasting too much time in your inventory. Second new thing are discussion between/among people. Now you can decide whether you would drink, eat, look away, what is good. On the other hand when you decide what to say you use movement keys, i.e. you move around and very often you loose possibility to express what you wanted to say (of course later I find out, that it is possible also by mouse without any movement).

Difficulty balance is strange for me, as a newcomer started on normal difficulty. Most of the time I felt like terminator until I met Oda boss, which was unbeatable moment for me, since I never struggle during previous game play. Shortly after that moment I realize another spoil aspect of the game. When I should decided whether to decide for Voodoo Boys or NetWatch, I literally did not care. Story is so uninteresting, that I did not care about anybody and anything in this game. Apart from lasts quests for individual friends, it is very different in comparison to the Witcher 3 were I was interested since the beginning. Finally at the end I enjoy Panam, Judy and Peralez family quests. Either way what remains from W3 is, that some options leads to different outcome than what I wanted to do.

In summary it is average game, which can be fun to play similarly like Sleeping Dogs or Ghostwire: Tokyo. Main problem is, that there is obviously extreme amount of work left, maybe if there would make more DLCs, CD projekt could finish also main game. Some people complain about missing FSR4 support, what I understand – it would be better, but it is important to say, that CD projekt cooperate with nVidia very closely, so it is understandable, that newer version DLSS is preferred here. On the other hand I must say, that Cyberpunk content is mature in comparison to The Witcher 3. Things which happen in game seems not so romantic, but more natural.

BUGS (v. 2.21): One quest cannot be finished (The gig), some things are in the air and many time game stops receiving commands from keyboard… very often car disappeared right in front of me, car view setting was reseting all the time and when I have to deposit weapons before entering some club it did not recover my setting (including clothes from some reason). So all in all nothing game breaking, just very annoying deteriorating game experience. E.g. in Phantom Liberty woman ask me for help in car and then hit by the same car… Phanam standing next to me ask for meeting at my place by sms… From some reason game putting my clothes off very often etc.

Phantom Liberty is basically more of the same like base game.

Finished Murder by Numbers, a visual novel with Picross puzzles. The graphics are good and the story interesting but it was way too long and puzzles were too difficult in the end.

I used hints to finish the puzzles of the 4th case (the last one).

Full list here.

Just finished 8Doors: Arum's Afterlife Adventure. 100% completion, first playthrough on normal, a little over 16 hours.
Not bad. My only criticism would be that the distance from save points to boss rooms is a bit far. Since it would usually take me a couple of tries before I could beat some of the bosses, I would have to traverse quite a distance to get back to the fight. Otherwise, a pleasent experience.

Ooh that soundtrack.

Faith. I played the demo of this a while back and thought it was interesting, so I got the complete version here. You control a priest battling demons with nothing more than a cross you hold up, occasionally picking up items to be used to complete puzzles that are mostly pretty simple. Its style takes after C64 games, to the point that I wouldn't be surprised to see someone attempt an actual demake, although the rotoscoped cutscenes might be a tough nut to crack. Dialogue is delivered to evoke classic 1980s voice synthesizers and it works really well. It's similar to how Locomalito managed to make ZX Spectrum platformers seem moody when he made L'Abbaye des Morts. Something about the bold colors on a mostly black background.

It's not especially hard, although figuring out how to 100 percent the game might take some work, which bumps up the play time a little bit. I had to replay some parts to get the best endings. It's one of those games where it can be as much fun to see how things go wrong as right.

I guess I could nitpick how a Catholic-themed game opens with a Protestant hymn :p I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel, though.

Hogwarts Legacy

I'll not waste much time discussing the controversy surrounding the game. Everyone has to form their own opinion about it and decide for themselves whether they'd want to support it or not. As author of the HP books, J.K Rowling naturally profited from this project, even though she was not involved in the creative process and the dev team does not seem to endorse her views. They even made sure to stress inclusiveness with certain characters, although they did so more by telling than showing, so both sides of the fence will have something to complain about. I'll just ignore this in my review and focus on the rest.

The most stunning aspect of the game are probably the beautiful visuals. I really liked the views, the landscapes, the castle and ruins, and in this regard, the open world is a pleasure to explore. There are also a lot of details to discover when strolling the corridors of the wizard school, lots of casual conversations and animations that breathe life into the setting, which is additionally aided by great sound design. I also enjoyed the soundtrack and I liked the voice acting a lot. The character customization was fun, and flying on a broomstick was a hoot (despite the absence of Quidditch in the game). The layout of the Hogwarts buildings was a bit confusing and you could seriously get lost in there, but I believe this is in line with the novels and films, so well done. Last but not least, I appreciated that they didn't just base the lore on the HP books but also included the better aspects of the Fantastic Beasts series, so that on top of playing a student of magic at Hogwarts like Harry Potter, you also get to be a rescuer and caretaker of magical beasts like Newt Scamander. All in all, they captured the setting and lore very well and made sure fans of the franchise would feel right at home. I'd definitely recommend the game as a touristic journey into the world of HP,

The story was a bit of a mixed bag. Some parts of it, like the beginning and finale, were exciting, others felt needlessly drawn out, and on the whole, the plot was a bit too simple to really draw me in. But at least it wasn't such a convoluted, unconvincing mess as the plots of the Fantastic Beast movies. The characters of teachers and students didn't particularly stand out to me, but they were likable enough, maybe with the exception of Sebastian, who - unsurprisingly and stereotypically - was of House Slytherin and got more and more annoying over the course of the game; I wasn't too fond of the writing regarding his character, and also how you are more or less forced to go along with that. Sure, you could skip some of his quests, but not all of them, since his theatrics also affect the main quests. I also didn't like how casually they treated the forbidden curses and especially the killing curse Avada Kedavra, in part. (Or killing in general, which you will do all the time in this game.)

So now that I've talked about setting and story, next up is gameplay. And that is mostly based on your average open world game à la Ubisoft, mixed with Arkham/AC style combat. In some way the devs get creative adapting this to the Hogwarts setting, but in others they fail to make it convincing.

I will have to say that I enjoyed the combat system very much. The game is rather easy on the whole, but I didn't mind because it's just so much fun to feel so powerful and have so many different (and familiar) spells and consumables at your disposal ... that I hardly ever used them all. But it gives you enough room to customize your playstyle. And I love how everyone always calls out the name of the spells while casting, that's just so unique and funny. What was a bit inconvenient though is having more spells than fit into your quickslots (4 sets of 4 slots, at max). And some of those spells were only needed for rare, very specific puzzles in the game, but I was often forced to switch out my current spell setup just for a required single use of one particular spell. I wish you could have at least prepared different (meta) sets of your setups that you could have switched to and back from with the press of a button, instead of having to switch out single spells all the time. (The same, btw, goes for the cosmetic costumes. I enjoyed changing my character's outfit from time to time, but you always have to find and switch out individual parts like hat, gloves, glasses, cloak etc. and can't store whole outfit combinations for quick access.)

As for the creative part of the open world gameplay, I liked, for example, that they based it on the idea of a field guide with various challenges to beat and that you got xp, level ups and rewards mostly just from completing these challenges. (Even though, admittedly, it was not really fitting to the narrative either, when at school they often tell you to stay out of danger, not go to the Forbidden Forests and such, but then your field guide, given out by school, requires you to defeat lots and lots of dark wizards and spiders and trolls and such).

Concerning the fails in copying your typical open world formula, I didn't think it was fitting to the Harry Potter world at all to make students hunt after measly loot and even break into houses for it or rob the teachers right under their noses, without them even taking notice. All the treasure chests and flour sacks and money pouches were way too much and too distracting, preying on your OCDs with little gain for the players. You can also easily fall into the trap of constantly using your Revelio spell key to highlight/reveal all the loot containers in your surrounding for fear of missing out. And even though I know noone forced me to do it, I still think the game would have been more enjoyable without it. The worst offender, however, was combining the Alohomora spell with the most trivial lockpicking mini-games and then have so many locks in the game. Why do I need to pick a lock when I already cast the opening spell on a door? It makes no sense at all, it's just tedious, copy-pasted busywork that makes the game feel more repetitive than it has to be. I also didn't like that a quest requires you to pick lots and lots of level 1 or level 2 locks and hunt for lots and lots of collectibles just to grant you the skill to open level 3 locks and do more of the same. (Oh, and speaking of minigames, the one they make you do for learning each spell is so pointless and unnecessary, it can't even be called a QTE event, it's completely without challenge. I did like the Summoner's Court game though - which was an actual game - and the flying challenges were alright, too).

Other aspects I found subpar: You can only ever track one quest at once. And there is too much traveling to and fro for quests. You've got fast traveling options, but in combination with the above that means you'll constantly interrupt gameplay in order to open your map and jump back to where you need to be, resulting in lots of loadscreens, which I found a bit immersion-breaking. Also, large parts of the game felt like an on-going tutorial. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised about that, seeing that the game is about attending a school, but it was pretty tiring still. I often postponed quests about teaching me the basics and explored the open world instead, because it was just too much and never seemed to stopped. Many quests felt more like a chore than something I was excited to do, but you have to trudge through in order to get all of your spells and access to all of the systems. If you spent 50-60 hours with the game, a few hours worth of tutorial might not seem like much in comparison, but it's still a few HOURS worth of tutorial, and who really enjoys having to go through that?

Some things also didn't work quite as well as they should or were buggy, e.g. characters talking were interrupted by voice mail messages or vice versa, or characters would give you hints on puzzles after you've already solved them or while you're (predictably) engaged in combat and likely didn't even notice the puzzle yet. One character would admonish me for stealing from someone else like an NPC had tried to make me do when in truth I just gave that NPC what he wanted out of my own supply, without ever needing to break into another's house. In one scene, a previously populated town was overrun with monsters to fight, and the NPCs like a merchant had been removed or made invisible for this scene, but that didn't prevent this merchant from still speaking his one-liners as if he was still standing there. And a few times, I managed to get stuck in the environment, but to the dev's credit, that was a rare occasion in such a big open world, and it was easily rectified by reloading (you can save manually most of the times, and the game also autosaves a lot, so I never really lost significant progress).

So, it's not exactly a perfect, must-play title, but still a quite solid open world game and I found enough to like here that I would recommend it at least to HP fans who don't feel the need to boycott it for external reasons.