For me, this is a worthy successor to Splinter Cell Chaos Theory- even if it is top-view 2D. Number and depth of mechanics- both stealth and combat- is nigh unparalleled.
Not kidding; The Witcher 2 and The Witcher 3 share a lot of mechanics, but have very different game-design philosophies. The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077 have vastly different mechanics (3rd person swords VS 1st person shotter), but share the same line of thought when it comes to gameplay design (interaction with the world and the NPCs, mission structure, depth of mechanics and so on). This is not to say that CP77 is a re-skin of TW3, not even close, but to say that this is a step forward- but in the same direction. A particularly noticble improvment is mission design, however, is how RPG mechanics come into play where you can brute-force through a door, hack the lock, bribe the guard, convince the man inside to just let you in, find a key to the back door or find a secret entrance from the sewer. Bottom line, it's a fun, beautiful and immersive game with a surprising amount of CRPG mechanics. Highly recommended.
The music is excellent, the plot is well written, the game looks beautiful and most importantly- the levels and the options the beat them are a masterclass of real-time-tactics.
tl;dr- If you can handle the heavy RPG elements that demand you to manually do everything and handle the bit junkiness in an otherwise beautiful and a massive game, this is a treat. I once heard someone describing Kingdom Come as an "analog game in the digital age", and I think that it's a spot-on description; very little happens automatically, and you have to manually, continually and procedurally perform just about any action- be it wash the player’s cloths that get dirty during travel and influence charisma or learning fighting skills that require actual repetition and training to gradually become effective. In other words, you have to immerse yourself in the role, in this case a medieval plebeian teenager and do what he would do- even the annoying parts. Other than that, it’s a debut game by a new studio, and as such comes with the ruggedness expected in its handling, stability and sometimes even performance. This is not to say that the game is a buggy mess, but that it’s not a super smooth and polished AAA game either. That said, the quantity, quality and presentation of content could fool you to think that this is, in fact, a major studio release.
Metro Exodus is the 3rd game in the Metro series. It takes a departure from the strictly linear design of the 2 previous games and introduces open-world elements. -The elephant in the room: it's not an open world game. It's not a Ubisoft game with a huge "go anywhere, do whatever" map with endlesly copy-pasted side qeusts dotted all over it. Instead, it's a series of of open maps - some are small, some are large, some are linear like the classic Metro and some are open just as much as they're linear (akin to the level design in the original Crysis) - and each map has a clear end goal, with the open world serving as the freedom of approuch to tasks at hand and to achieve side goals/missions that relate, often dirrectly, to either the main task at hand or the plot. The other big concern here is the departure from the clastrophobic tunnel of the Metro, for which the game is named, but without going into spoilers- you'll spend enough time in clastrophobic eviorments both on and below ground. In my opinion, the open-world was handled tactfully -Atmosphere: what always sets Metro apart is the atmosphere. Here, it's as briliant as always. -Gameplay: in terms of gameplay, it's Metro Last Light V2.0; Movment is smoother, shooting is more reactive, enemies are a bit smarter. That's really it. -Mechanics: an understadable change that I didn't like was replacing bullet currency with 2 types of crafting materials (bio and tech). It allows you to clean your gun (that will jam otherwise), make bullets (you'll still always be short on those) and other small stuff. -Story: I think it's good and less formulaic than others. There's no grand end goal (some time is spent on looking for a goal at all) and no main villain. It's about the journey and the people. Note: when playing, note that not all enemies are assholes that deserve to die. Saying byond that is a spoiler. Note: I bought on a different store before reealizing it's aavlible on GOG.
The entire game is viewed from above, with the maps stailised to look almost like blueprints and maps the operators would use to plan their attack, but you get to do the planing, drawing the path, viewing direction and actions of each charecter. This can be done in real time, in the more challenging "1 perfect plan" or a combination of both. While the basics are simple, the game offers excellent depth in both mechanics and game design: do you bring a handgun or hard-to-maneuver-indoors shotgun? Do you send a guy from the back, or concentrate fire up front? Blast the door and risk injuring the hostage, or take your time braking in, risking not making it on time to save him? Do you risk skiping checking the closet to save critical time, or do you go for it to avoid getting supprised from the back? Viewing the real-time replay of the misson make it look like just afew seconds, but a challenging mission can 30 and more minutes of planing and experimintation. Bottom line: highly recomanded for lovers of the various tactical geners.
