I was worried that it would demystify the lore of the world, particulary the Outsider, too much, but no, absolutely not. In my opinion the plot is way more interesting than the one of the main game (which had memorable and great characters, but a generic plot), the artstyle, atmosphere and gameplay are fantastic again and.... I don't know how to phrase it, but towards the end I just felt absolutely in awe.
I feel like I want to give 5 stars for the artstyle, the really cool gameplay ideas, the likeable characters, and the general message of the story. At the same time I want to give 3 stars for the actual execution of the gameplay ideas, the short length of the story, and the fact that many plotlines felt not as much explored as would have been good. So, hence, 4 stars. Particuarly the Imag was a REALLY COOL and fantastic idea for the P&C adventure genre, but it was extremely underutilised.
As someone who grew up in the Alpine region, but not directly in Switzerland, it felt like visiting familiar neighbours. The artstyle is wonderful, and I do think the handdrawn textures work really well with the lowpoly look and the black&white aesthetics of it all, capturing a quite unsettling atmosphere like many old movies had. Atleast in my eyes. Additionally, having the game fully voiced in Rhaeto-Romanic was a really cool, and wonderful sounding experience! The story itself is the sort of tale, from the eerie mountain peaks down to the farmers lifes and worries, which is really, really familiar to me, so I basically saw everything more or less coming from the first handshake onwards, but this didn't detract from my joy of the game, on the contrary, it felt all so well fitting together. Additionally, I have to say, I loved the absolutely dry humour of the game, blending the ridiculous with the unsettling in a really good way. Oh, and I enjoy that the "courage juice" wasn't alcohol but coffee.
As always with Arkane, I found the plot and dialogue writing to be mediocre. Neither bad nor good, it just did it's job. However, the artstyle, worldbuilding, gameplay, atmosphere and so on was absolutely fantastic and I loved every mission. The sheer amount of possibilities alone is fantastic. Additionally: Delilah design was absolutely fantastic and I lowkey wish she had won.
Extremely enjoyable, the Sino-Japanese war was, imo, a really important frontline of the Pacific Theatre of WW2 and still it's neglected by most media, it was an extreme fun to play!
While I think that German campaign ins WW2 games are most often done to the death, this one shines by spotlighting the early parts of the war before Operation Barbarossa, from Poland, over Norway to the Benelux and France, then Yugoslavia and so on and so forth. I also really enjoyed that decisions in some missions carry over, like the armoured train you can capture in Poland.
The mixture of naval warfare and island hoping made this campaign really cool, the end was a bit "out there", but nonetheless satisfying
Lesser explored parts of WW2 always get me and the Burma Road was pretty cool to play
Playing as minor nations in WW2 is always a joy for me, and this Finnish campaign was particularly fun!
One of my most favourite medieval/renaissance trading simulators with soft city builder elements. The atmosphere alone makes it fantastic to play
