As other most critical reviews have said, "This IS a BORING game". Not even the story is able to catch you, forcing yourself to go through all this suffering (I've watched the entire story on Youtube and discovered that finishing this game to know the ending is not even worth it ) Alan Wake on its announcement was supposed to be an open world game with investigative mechanics similar to deadly premonition in the concept. Instead (I'm going to repeat what the other most negative reviewers said) it is an extremely linear game, you are really going on a straight line in this game with zero decisions and freedom. But I have to say that this is not bad, indeed we have a lot of games that are "linear titles" also if not in an exaggerated way as AW. RE 4, RE 5, Outlast are all games that require a linear progession, but they are enjoiable So the real problem of AW is in the variety as stated before by others what you will do for the first 4 h IS (and it is only the beginning): 1- watching a cutscenes of 5 min with worthless conversations (the most enjoiable thing in this game by the way) 2- running around in a lot of woods fallowing a straight path and collecting batteries for the torch. 3- fighting darkness stupid mountaineers and yokels, using the light of the torch and your pistol, while you are intent to avoid their axes (the machanics is not funny and the effect of the torch on the enemies is annoying). 4- REPEAT. And I'm not joking this is what you do for the first 4h of game because this is what I've done in the first 4h of the game before quitting, ironically I was fainally out of the wood after 4h of boring agony and for 5 min I was happy to be in a new location, but then during a cutscene the police surround you and you jump again in the damn wood. There is were I've quitted, and I'm only at the beginning of the game because this game is more than 10h that you will spend running around in the wood (just watch a youtube video to get confirm).
I Start by saying that the game is entertaining, also if the mechanics are repetitive like hell. By a gameplay stand point there are few things that I really don't liked MECHANICS 1.For the entire game you will find yourself going up and down in the patient rooms using your recorded conversation, watching and playing flashback. I've read some people complaining about that because they have to hear the conversation again and again. Guss what? just press the escape button two times to skip dialogs and every long action in the game, David will make you know that the recording played was right saying "mmmhh". But there isn't always a logical connection that make you think that you have to go in the room number # and play the record number # to trigger the patient. I've used a walkthrough at some point. 2.Things are triggered only when you do a specific action, this is a bit hard to explain. But let's say that I have a torch, and I need to turn it on in a dark room that is enlightened, obviously I need to switch off the light in the room using the control panel. That is easy, but the game doesn't let you do that, indeed the NPC will tell you to "fuck around and don't touch the control panel". And guess why? I need to go in to the room when the light is still on, then turn on the torch light so that David will say something and only then I will be able to switch off the light using the control panel, without being stopped by the NPC, that for just a second has changed his mind with no reason at all. Also sometimes impredictable events, impossible to knows, need to happen to continue the game. STORY I will say that there are so few characters in this game and they seems to me much more a bunch of robots than humans, but the story is entertaining until the final chapter, oh god the final chapter, it's just the end of the world with that nonsense honeyed ending. Just a pile of shit, IRREDEEMABLE. All the protagonist development is throwed in the toilet with the story.
Todd Howard's Redguard enhanced-remastered-masterpiece edition. Run like shit.
TMB 1 - 3 stars TMB 2 - 2 stars TMB 3 - 2 stars The tomb raider series is for me a question mark in video games. I've never been able to go very far with this tree titles or the following ones. Tomb Raider 1 is the most appealing duo to the location visited by Lara, that have a good atmosphere but the second and the third seems a rehash of the first with different locations also if you visit a lot of new locations and there is much more traveling i really cannot get in them. The gameplay behind TR in general is not so great for my standard. Jumping on blocky platform, shooting at random animals ( TR1 still have a point on this, the wildlife is varied and seems to integrate better in the level but the other TR...bleh) is not a big deal. To be honest i've not even finished the TR1 but i went farther in the story than for all the others TR games. The problem is that i risk of dying of consumption every time i try to go further. With TR2 the boredom starts riding me, before being able to finish the Venice campaign i want to quit the game because 1) Venice and the next level (i looked at them on youtube) are so unimpressive 2) killing some stupid spongebob dudes armed with shotguns is not what i really want to do 3) i'm tired of killing animals (really i don't undersand why but seams that TR is all about animals that hate Lara, and Lara returns the feeling of hatred) 4) puzzle are heavy (not hard but heavy, like carring something heavy on the shoulders) 5) the pace of the game in general and this is also valid fot TR 1 is very slow. I'm never gone more further away than that. And with TR3 is also worst i've not even finished the first level, and they are the good levels of TR3 and TR2 compared to the next levels. (the only two appealing levels for me in TR 2-3).
A very challenging game with some of the most intense dungeons and deadly traps. Some of this dungeons are very inspired, 'The Pit' that is a descent in to the abyss of darkness 'The Hive' a nest full of mantises, 'Labyrinth' and 'Trench' and many others. They have a catching atmoshpere, with a lot of nice enemies to slay (or to get slayed), there are only two maps that i found heavily poor appealing to me, 'Inversion' and the final dungeon 'Dragon', that doesn't reflect the expectations ('Spire', the first dungeon, is much more a training dungeon, so very moderate in difficulty). Without considering all the long range weapons and magics that you can use to easily progress in the game. Some enemies that seams very hard to get killed are very weak to some particular magic or weapon. This game has almost everything you can ask for a game dungeon considering that this is a 1998 product. Unfortunately the fact that to survive inside the dungeons you need to be very cautious, has given a bad reputation to this game. I agree that mastering the controls is not for everybody, and that sometimes in some situations you have to deal with a bad camera angle that don't let you see everything (just press the First Person key, by the way. The dude can also parry and go in first person while he/she is still in the parry mode) but i'm not sure what people means when they say that this title sucks so bad that it should be removed from the history of videogames, because this is a unique title that will never be repeated in other future games. Some say that this is a Tomb Raider clone (maybe derivative) but the only thing that TB and DTD have in common is the game engine (if i'm not wrong) , the same publisher, and a female character (that is like saying that Heavy Metal FAKK is a tomb raider clone because "FEMALES!!!") CONS: In the 1998 action game stories were weak but i can say that the ending of DTD is just 'pathetic' bacause doesn't make sense (a Diablo 1 cutscene error mby?)
