After finishing Daggerfall (Unity) I was still in the mood for some dungeon crawling. A linear and more old-school dungeon crawl more reminiscent of Ultima Underworld sounded very appealing to me on paper. I picked up Battlespire despite the bad reputation, and boy, the infamy is deserved. The game is a buggy mess. Bugs and issues such as: movement feels off and jumping has a high chance of getting stuck in the level geometry, enemies tend to get stuck, enemies can float off the game level, and can kill themselves with their own AoE damage spells trying to target you but hitting the level geometry instead. Most notably there is a big potential for a save corruption bug in one of the levels. The engine itself felt so buggy and unstable that it felt like it was from a realm of Oblivion itself. Even when it works the game has fundamental design issues: attributes and character creation options that don't do anything or don't do what the manual or the game says they do, strange logic with some of the mandatory puzzles, like for example, requiring you to interact with what you think are static level objects, but the game has no indication or hints they might be interactable. The game difficulty also is heavily skewed towards a battlemage type (which fits the protagonist's background) with restoration magic as there are limited healing opportunities outside of healing spells. Potions can't be bought or gained with a certainty during a level, and there is no way to rest. Despite all the technical and design issues mentioned there is a lot to be enjoyed with the right mindset. The art direction, combined with the dark ambient music, creates an atmosphere that is something truly special and distinct from other Elder Scroll games. The more low-poly Playstation 1 era graphics, combined with some good 2D UI art, ooze with atmosphere. The level design (both visual and functional), aside from moon logic puzzles, is generally pretty good and big step up from Daggerfall. Each of the seven levels feel distinct and varied. The story of the game is okay. Enter Battlespire, go through the various realms of Oblivion, kill the big bad at the final level. Simple enough. However the lore expanding over the daedric realms is some of the best in the series. Despite The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion dealing with a daedric invasion and the realms of Oblivion, I learned a lot more about the daedra princes and the daedra themselves in this game. The dialogue however is for the most part insanely silly which I didn't enjoy at first, but started to give me a welcome chuckle and respite from all the gameplay problems. The gameplay overall is serviceable when it works. The combat never feels especially good but it is not so bad either. At times enemies can have too much health and deal way too much damage. The difficulty is all over the place in general. The most tedious aspect is knockback caused by enemy attacks and spells, combined with bad movement and jumping, which made the final level in Mehrunes Dagon's hell realm more hellish than it needed to be. Despite all of the issues mentioned I did for the most part really enjoy the game. The visuals and music carried the game for me and I was fascinated by the lore and machinations of the daedra. When the game worked it was serviceable enough to keep going, even if the final level was one of the most tedious sections in any game in recent memory. I can't give the game more than 2 stars though. If you are not hooked by the atmosphere if the game, I can't really recommend it to anyone except the most diehard of Elder Scrolls fans and jank enjoyers. With a modern source port fixing the technical issues, combined with a balance pass to make the difficulty more tolerable and make some of the character stats actually functional, this game could be a 3 or 4 for me. Until that day comes you are better off visiting the realms of Oblivion in other Elder Scrolls games.
Overall an enjoyable module, and if you are an NWN fanatic (and chances are if you are looking to buy a DLC for a 22+ year old game) you should get it. I would rank it lower than Hordes, Daggerford and Tyrants, but not much. Like some reviews have already said: the module feels more like a continuation of other modules (namely Tyrants of the Moonsea and Darkness over Daggerford) than the OC, but I found the story told very enjoyable. It tells a good enough story of its own, but it is intended to be a part one of a larger saga of modules. In addition: if you have years of experience with other D&D games and books (especially Icewind Dale 1&2 and the Icewind Dale trilogy of books) you will find a lot of callbacks to those which is delightful. The module is linear but it has a decent amount of side content similar to Tyrants of the Moonsea. My gripes in the gameplay department are mainly bugs (I had one main quest breaking but I could fix it with the console and one bug forced me to do a long backtrack as I was teleported to a wrong location) and the unfair fights in the first couple of hours. Even on Easy difficulty the early fights with yeti and ice trolls were down to pure luck with my Fighter/Rogue/Blackguard as I had barely any equipment. After the half way point (4-5 hours) the fights became trivial even on D&D Hardcore difficulty though. Regarding length and level advancement: I got to level 13 in roughly 10 hours while doing what I believed was most of the side quests. In conclusion: Is the module good? Yes. Is it worth getting at full price? Yes, if you are obsessed about NWN and D&D. For a more casual NWN/D&D fan I would consider getting it on a sale.
Combine Doom Eternal and E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy, and what you get is a solid, but janky fast-paced FPS with a light touch of RPG elements. When the game is firing on all cylinders it is a blast to play, but not all systems and mechanics feel refined. Occasionally the game can crash and enemies can get stuck inside terrain which did halt my progression twice and forced me to reload. I even had a bug where my HUD completely disappeared and the only solution was to restart the mission for some reason. Not even restarting the game and loading the save could fix it. I would love to give the game a 4, as the game's art direction is stunning and the gameplay is good when it works, but the game is too unrefined to warrant it. If you are a fan of Warhammer 40K and/or fan of fast paced FPS games, then don't hesitate to get it on sale. Combined with the issues mentioned and the relatively short length (maybe 8 hours if you skip all side missions), I would not recommend to get it full price.
I got this in 2021 mainly to play the two of the new Enhanced Edition only modules sold as DLC as I felt the Diamond edition was sufficient enough for me. However I kept playing this version to play co-op with my friends and some of the community spotlighted modules like Siege of Shadowdale. Unlike Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition which is not a 100% improvement over the original, this one feels more like it (with years of patching at least). I have barely had any issues and at least playing co-op with one or two friends through the official content, it has rare almost flawlessly online too. Whether all of the Diamond edition modules work on this on I cannot say. Giving it 4 stars since if you only play solo and are not interested in the premium DLC or multiplayer, this is not really a needed purchase if you already own the Diamond Edition. However as time goes on, there will probably be more mods that require this, so get this one on sale at some point.
As a huge fan of the Baldur's Gate series and rest of the Infinity Engine series. I think that the Pathfinder games are a true successor to those games, especially Wrath of the Righteous. The game is quite niche though, and certainly not for everyone. If you like huge, long campaigns and obsessing over builds and systems, then this your game.
This game seems to have quite a mixed reception but for me it was pretty solid game for 10 euros. The game is a mixture of poor man's Deus Ex and a competent God of War clone to put it simply. The game has stealth sections that allow you to completely skip combat encounters or weaken them by hacking to disable cameras and turrets, take down opponents via melee takedowns or a crossbow, and sabotage fuse boxes to weaken reinforcements to combat arenas. The stealth gameplay is a bit barebones and not super exciting, however it did start to grow on me as the game went on. Cyanide's Styx: Shards of Darkness was a more pure stealth game which was very good, so I am somewhat surprised they didn't make the stealth game as engaging this time around. When stealth fails or you choose to not even try to stealth, you'll become a werewolf. In werewolf mode the game becomes an surprisingly solid action game where you slaughter enemies in combat arenas with waves of reinforcements. Even if you fail your stealth attempt, what you did during stealthing does matter. Depending on your actions you will have less enemies to fight, disabled turrets, more rage (you gain rage resource from enemy takedowns, which gives you an edge in combat), and weaker reinforcements. Even if I failed stealth I didn't feel punished or frustrated as my efforts were still making a difference, the werewolf combat being fun also helps. The game is not very long (10 hours or so) but then again the game's formula gets a bit repetative, but the latter half was much more challenging and exciting. The story, voice acting, writing are all okay. Competent but not especially memorable. This game is maybe more of a 3.5/5 but I am rounding it up for the sheer novelty of the game. The mix of vastly different stealth and action gameplay can probably feel like too much for some, but if the barebones stealth is not your cup of tea you can for the most part ignore it completely.
I enjoyed Frogware's previous foray into the Cthulhu-mythos, The Sinking City, which was a rough game but a very enjoyable Lovecraft-inspired investigation game despite the poor combat gameplay. I have not played any of the Sherlock games made by Frogwares, but I might try them out after playing this one. Overall it is a great game. The gameplay elements from Sinking City are there (the mind palace, reconstructing crime scenes, the archive system), albeit without any sort of combat which is actually a plus in my book. The mythos elements are more subdued and implied instead of being fully overt like in The Sinking City. While over the top at times, the scenarios are still logical and plausible. I enjoyed the balance of Sherlock losing grasp of reality trying to rationalize the events while Watson tried to keep him sane. The length and pacing of the game were fine. I played offline so I didn't track my game time but I think somewhere between 8-10 hours. I took my time and did most of the side cases. The last chapter and the ending were alright, but I hoped a bit more. The difficulty of the game felt just alright. I checked a walkthrough two times around the middle of the game but compared to old school point & click adventure games this is a walk in the park. You can customize your difficulty so I kept everything at the hardest settings but I chose to keep displaying interaction indicators to see what can be clicked or not. Regarding the DLC content it is a mixed bag. There are some genuinely good side cases, some okay but short, and others just simple find and collect X items cases. The latter type of cases I skipped. I bought the premium edition mainly to support the developers, but I found the side cases overall a nice addition and the side cases make exploring the open world levels more rewarding. In conclusion: a solid investigation game that feels both fresh and also a bit old school at times. If you enjoyed The Sinking City you will surely enjoy this one.
The game itself is excellent and the port was okay for me at least when playing with an Xbox 360 controller. Better than the first game but the latter 3rd felt a bit rushed to me. More classes and each class has more options than in the first game. Definitely recommended but wait for a sale.
Despite the high price point I decided to bite the bullet and buy the game, and glad I did, I found the game to be a very solid action-RPG. It is more simpler than say Diablo and most Diablo-likes but I found the game to have just enough itemization and build options to make it interesting. Puzzles, simple platforming, traps and key/item hunting break up the monotony of hacking and slashing. Story was nothing interesting but the quality voice acting (Tony Jay and Jim Cummings to name a couple) made it feel slighly more grandiose. For Baldur's Gate fans there is not much here that feels like Baldur's Gate, and apart from the Baldur's Gate itself in act 1 there is barely any characters of plot elements from Baldur's Gate 1 or 2. However there are many returning voice actors from those games which is appreciated. Overall a great game which doesn't stay its welcome (took 11h to complete, but there is a new game + option as far as I know). It is rather simple by todays standards but I found it charming. A must buy for genre fans but wait for a sale as 30€ is asking a bit too much. To be noted: I played the game solo with an Xbox 360 controller, as keyboard and mouse controls didn't feel that good to play.
I got this for 4 euros and my expectations were not high. The first 3 or so hours was a bit tedious but after you get your first god powers (a Path of Exile inspired skill tree) it started to get a lot better at least for my Soldier character. The full game with the vanilla campaign and the dlc campaigns took me 16 hours (which I blasted in 2 days straight). In that time I hit the level cap around act 4 and I finally got to level 50 on the extra level (similar to Diablo 3 yet again). While the game is quite repetetive especially with its map usage (per act there are usually 1-3 same maps/dungeons that get used for each quest) it does respect the player's time. For some the relatively short length and lack of interesting end game can be deal breaker but I personally like it in this instance. I will probably replay the game with a more interesting character and then explore the end game content it has. Overall a fairly decent Diablo 3 clone (with enough differences to make it intersting enough) which somehow I found more enjoyable than actual Diablo 3 (I am biased but might be due expectations). There are lot of better ARPGs out there like Grim Dawn and Last Epoch but if you get this cheap it will most likely satisfy most ARPG fans.
