Amid Evil has the best enemy variety of all retro shooters out there. Every mini-campaign introduces multiple new monsters to kill. The weapons are designed so well and are really fun to use. The "Rocket Launcher" in this game shoots planets for crying out loud! The only "alt fire" in this game are super-charged versions of each existing weapon that absolutely MELTS enemies. Level design is incredibly well done and finding secrets, keys, and navigating each map is more fun than it frankly should be. But most importantly, Amid Evil has my favorite soundtrack of all the retro shooters I've played so far. Ion fury, Dusk, Prodeus, and even Project Warlock have incredible music. However, Andrew Hulshult,s work in Amid Evil is my personal favorite. Amid Evil's soundtrack has "dynamic music", where the music intensifies and changes depending on where you are in the level. It's kind of similar to how tracks in the "Deus Ex" games are played. This game is an absolute MUST PLAY for fans of retro shooters and FPS games in general!!!
This game is so much fun, i refuse to deduct any stars just because of a dumb checkpoint system. It basically works like this... First of all, you can't save/load your progress. And when you die, you will respawn at a nearby "nexus point" with 100% health and ZERO progress lost. All enemies you killed remain dead. It sort of works the way Vita Chambers do in Bioshock or Restoration Bays in System Shock. It's kind of a bummer and removes some difficulty from an otherwise challenging game. BUT, who cares? Because this game is incredibly fun and here's why! - Tons of well designed and powerful weapons! Just to name a few... a quad shotgun, plasma rifle, and a "swarmer" that fires a barrage of lock-on micro missiles. All weapons have a great alternative fire mode and add plenty of variety to the combat. - Well designed levels with plenty of secrets! You find key-cards and navigate classically designed FPS levels, but there's a great variety of environments and each place you go has a unique feel to them. - Lots of different enemies! There's a reason Wolfenstein 3d didn't age well while classic doom is still a blast to play. You'll encounter plenty of different enemies that each have their own way of attacking to the player. This keeps the player on their toes at all times! - AMAZING SOUNDTRACK. Andrew Hulshult's work on Dusk, Amid Evil, and Doom Eternal's DLCs were fantastic. And this game is no different. You'll have lots of head banging tunes to jam to while killing stuff in this game. - It's also worth mentioning that despite being made in the Unity Engine, this game performs well on most PCs and looks really good for a retro FPS game. That's all i got! Prodeus is a blast from the past and any fan of retro shooters should pick this up immediately!
Honestly the asking price of $20 USD is a steal and here's why: - AMAZING Soundtrack! (Andrew Hulshult is a GOD and his work on this game, Doom Eternal Ancient Gods, Amid Evil, and his Doom 1 & 2 Remake Tracks are some of the best video game music you'll find) - Fast Paced, Violent, Adrenaline Fueled Action! - Sophisticated and Clever Level Design makes every level unique and fresh! - TONS OF VARIETY in enemies. You'll NEVER encounter the same enemy over and over and over. Lots of different enemies to shoot and make for a game that NEVER GETS BORING. - SUPER OPTIMIZED WITH NO BUGS OR CRASHES. This game will perform very well on any PC with plenty of customizable graphics and UI settings. If you enjoy shooters of any kind, buying this is a no-brainer. If you enjoy retro shooters like doom, quake, heretic, shadow warrior, blood, duke 3d, etc, then you are objectively MISSING OUT BY NOT GETTING THIS AMAZING GAME!
*Don't worry, no spoilers* So a super wealthy Japanese family meet on their fancy and mysterious island. All the characters have their own funny and interesting quirks. They kick back, have fun, and argue a lot. Some complications arise and spooky things start to happen. There's no decisions or role-playing or control by the player at all. This is a visual novel through and through. So it's just tons and tons of text, really good 2-D character sprites, and my personal favorite soundtrack of all time. If you're still unsure about buying this, get Chapter 1 of Higurashi and give that a quick read. It's short, it's not related to Umineko at all, but it shares some common themes and is another incredible Visual Novel written by the same dev/author. If you enjoyed Higurashi even a little bit, then i guarantee you'll absolutely LOVE Umineko.
If you've read the "Question - Arcs", then this is just a continuation of that. I don't write reviews, but I've never enjoyed a story as much as I did with Umineko. I loved the characters, the dialogue, the jaw-dropping plot-twists, and the music.... My god... the music is just incredible. Frankly, this is an obvious purchase if you enjoyed the "Question Arcs". And if you enjoyed Higurashi at all, then you owe it to yourself to give Umineko a read. I've read all the incredible Witcher books and watched unbelievably good TV shows like "The Wire" and "Breaking Bad", but reading the Umineko VNs was the most fun I've ever had in video games/books/movies/tv shows/media in general.
Frankly, if you enjoyed the previous games at all, then buying the finale of the Cold Steel series should be a no brainer... But here's a few reasons to convince ya. - Much like Cold Steel 1-3, 4's port is fantastic (like literally perfect... other devs should learn from this) - Story/Writing's is phenomenal. I personally felt that the story just got progressively better in each successive Cold Steel sequel. Quite a few few jaw-dropping moments happened in 4. Some of our favorite & lovable characters from earlier Legend of Heroes games make cameos/appearances. - Gameplay/Combat kept getting better with each new Cold Steel title & I personally think it peaked at 4. (Brave orders & Robot battle mechanics introduced in 3 were refined and overall really fun to spice up the franchise's classic combat system) - Super long game that never got boring (Each Cold Steel game took anywhere between 100 & 150 hours for me to finish) That's all i got. And for crying out loud, if you haven't played any of these games (Cold Steel OR Trails in the Sky), at least give the first one a whirl. I don't really write reviews, but the Cold Steel Series was just too much fun.
