If you dislike slow starts and games, that try to appear like a film, avoid this. The first 40 minutes are nothing but walking around and being trapped in rooms, until someone finishes his speech. 40 minutes. You could watch an episode of a good series in that time. @Devs: Imagine, how would someone describe this game – having not seen any trailers, advertisements of this game – not knowing anything about it – after playing the first 10 minutes ? What type of genre would he categorise it into ? What would be the perceived theme ? I personally believe, a the prologue of a game should much like the prologue of a film establish the genre and encapsulate the total experience in some way. Do not send the wrong signals to players and hope, they will ignore it and bring enough patience, to work through a boring start so they can get to the good stuff. Never rely on that.
This package contains Castelvania 3 only in its censored version (US or international version). 'Castlevania Anniversary Collection' contains both versions.
This is not a bad game in any shape or form. Merely ok, which is not good enough for me to finish it. The competition is to strong for that. Major problems are, firstly that the gameplay from AA seems to not work well for an open world, and secondly the criminal lack of an atmosphere. This is not Gotham, just some random city. The activities are not very interesting inside the world, most of them are collecting something. Bad already for any OW game, but worse for Batman, since this is simply not what he would do: flying around and pick up something ? Imagine a Bond game, where you walk around an area and collect items. Batman works best, when you are inside buildings and are driven by the story from start to finish like in AA. And that one had interesting collectables uncovering lore. The fighting is good, but has some issues, which annoyed me with time. Attacking the wrong guy or not reacting to buttons sometimes. Those stumblers can kick you out of the rhythm and then you are not in sync anymore with what is happening on the screen. But still, good enough to have some fun for 10 hours. Also, fuck snipers. Who asked for them to be included ?
The foundation of this game is heavily flawed: the movements. So much depend on it and many failures will root on, that your PC simply behaved in an unexpected way. The first level is flying and probably the best one. Bringing down an AT-AT with a rope is satisfying and not easy to do, making it very satisfying. Starting with Level 2 you control a human with which the problem starts; but the second level itself is just a corridorshooter with a few bulletsponges and not many chances the controls to reveal their true nature. Only your accidental movement or slow down may be annoying, as moving the mouse up and down duplicates the functionality of the W/S-keys. Moving the mouse sideways is used for aiming and as long as you do it correctly your movement won't be affected. Level 3 is a short turretsection, which became a bit annoying because of the repeated sounds of me spamming around. Level 4 is the first chance to abort the game: a platformer on a moving train with obstacles (to duck or jump over). Newton's law does not apply here, meaning the PC is not having the train's momentum as soon as he is in the air. Imagine a platformer where the ground just moves around. This level ends with a bossfight and reaching it has cost most of the available attempts, that are granted per level. Level 5 is like level 3, but this time not in save corridors, where you can not fall off, but in a canyon. I noticed several times, how my character suddenly slips in a direction as if he were on ice, leading to his death. This is were I paused the game. Also sometimes the HUD is not visible, which displays HP and the currently selected ammo, but that may be related me using Voodoo.
