In a way this game is the epitome of the kind of freedom a video game can offer, because it plops you into mundane, everyday situations and then lets you solve them with extreme and absurd violence. And it is fun to do that, but the game doesn't offer a lot of depth and I lost interest in it after less than two hours. The other big aspect, the game's humour, is... there, it's a very 2000s, extremely usamerican, post-9/11 kind of humour that's offensive in the most toothless, inoffensive way. It's hard to describe but it didn't help to keep me interested. All in all, Postal 2 is exactly what you'd expect it to be but ends up losing its luster quickly.
I found a lot to like in Weird West. The setting is novel and well fleshed-out, the world is very interactable, the five characters you play across your journey are varied and unique. Other areas are more troubled, I found the RPG elements rather lackluster. The character abilities you can unlock felt useless and outside the main quest there was little to do that had lasting consequences. And the controls, specifically how you activate abilities, is horribly clunky on controller, it genuinely takes four simulatenous button presses for some. Despite all this, I like this game a lot. The setting is just so charming, and aside from the clunky abilities the gameplay is actually quite fun and feels good. After my first playthrough I immediately started a second one and I have over 34h in the game now. I don't regret any of it and especially on sale I think it is well worth it.
Or at least faithfully remastered; I didn't experience any of the horrendous issues people had at launch years ago. As for the game itself, it's a fine first person shooter. The cell shaded graphics and comic book elements (such as a 'BOOM!' popping up on the screen when something explodes) are fun and make the game unique. There's a varied selection of weapons with however few exciting standouts, but really all in all it's *fine*. Not perfect or amazing, but not bad either and definitely fun for a playthrough.
If you intend to check this out because you liked the original Deus Ex from 2000, you probably won't have much fun with this. If you want more of the predecessor Human Revolution you'll probably be happy with this. I'm firmly in the former camp and for the 25h I played of this game I found it mostly uninteresting and unimaginative in both narrative and gameplay. It's not *bad* per se, but its entertainment value mostly derives from "haha shooting is fun", not from it challenging you in any way or letting you be creative in your approach to problems.
Definitely one of the most fun shooters I've played in recent times. Big levels with loads of secrets, a badass player character, varied arsenal of weapons, fair autosaves. Devs were unfortunately involved in some "controversy" about a lame joke and the f-slur; apologized for it, were hit with review bombing from farty gamergaters, ended up going back on their apology and it was all very... blegh and ugh and yikes. The lead dev did say at one point people should just pirate the game if they hate them so much, do with that what you like.
In my opinion, this is the best entry in the 2006-2008 reboot trilogy. Although the plot is nothing outstanding, Lara has a fun, kickass personality that kept me entertained and really want to see more of. The puzzles are entertaining and occasionally had me stumped at first, just enough to make them satisfying to solve. Combat is rather shallow and requires little thought, but movement is fun and has a learning curve. I especially enjoyed that there were many special moves you can perform that have no real gameplay purpose and just look and feel cool. It's definitely not a perfect game; the motorbike sequences aren't challenging or interesting and go on for much, much too long, the shallow combat does become a little tedious eventually, and there was the odd missed jump that didn't feel like my fault. But it was a really fun ride that I am glad to have been on.
I would have liked to enjoy this game after finishing Tomb Raider Legend, but the fact that you're constantly forced into combat with animals, which were already the most annoying kind of fight in Legend, made me quit after about an hour. Mindlessly running and jumping around while equally mindlessly pulling the trigger just isn't how I want to spend my time. I'm still giving it 3 stars because what I saw from the puzzles the game offers was interesting. If you like puzzles and don't mind the animal combat you will get some enjoyment out of this game.
