This is the first Hitman game I have played and I have to say that Agent 47 is already up there on my list of the most badass protagonists in computer games. This isn't only true of him as portrayed by the cutscene, but true of how you get to play as him as well... On Normal and Hard mode, at least. It was a lot of fun being a superhuman badass, infiltrating seemingly impenetrable places, or just shooting up a whole church full of bad guys like it was nothing. My only fault with this game is its bad cover system. I say "bad" because cover systems have been perfected at this point considering just how many modern computer games implement a cover mechanic. In this game, I felt like I was sliding in and out of cover by accident even up 'till the very end of the game. It could have been done better. I am also not a big fan of x-ray visions, slow-motion easy-kills and such, but it sure fits the character. Still, I would have preferred it if the game had some other, less extreme way of helping me feel like a badass. Similarly, the constant scoring of your actions is annoying and takes me out of the game. Suddenly, I don't want to do stuff the fun way, but the 'efficient and high score' way. Lastly, difficulty is another problem. On Normal and Hard mode the game is pretty easy. You can go guns blazing through the whole game without using much stealth at all. On higher difficulties, the game relies on your knowledge of the levels. I think the designers expected you to have completed the game once or twice before, as the game's challenge depends on you just remembering the one or two viable paths you can take; experimentation is no longer an option. Still, I recommend Hitman: Absolution. It's fun!
Lost Eden is a first person point & click adventure game - but NOT a Myst clone! Buyer beware: If you like adventure games for the challenging puzzles, stay away. The first page of this game's manual states that the intention here was to make an interactive movie, and while it still has more gameplay than the average 'cinematic' computer game released nowadays, it is just about experiencing the story. You'll beat this game in a flash. It took me around 5 hours to beat. I enjoyed the game a lot for its incredible setting, its engaging story and, most of all, it's unique soundtrack. The graphics look great even today and really create a world that feels lived in and important. I am giving this game 4/5 stars because of the lack of interesting and challenging gameplay. If not for that, I would have considered it an absolute 5-star game and one of my favorites. As it stands, it is just a very memorable adventure game with a soundtrack that I will keep replaying on my phone for years to come.
The game can be frustrating due to the awkward combat and controls, the tedious amounts of backtracking (that you can avoid using cheats - hint hint) and the buggy and unpolished nature of it. That said, I wholeheartedly recommend this game. I have rarely played a game that kept me this engaged all the way through to the end. If you want to go on an adventure in a fantasy world that is serious, humorous and mysterious in equal measure, you should give Gothic a chance. I really want to give it a 5/5, but I got frustrated one too many times. I have to stress though... Don't shy away from cheats.
I just beat Baldur's Gate for the first time using this Enhanced Edition, and I loved almost every minute of it. I got frustrated here and there, especially at the end, but beating the game was satisfying enough to make up for it. Really difficult when it counts (powerful enemies are appropriately powerful), but easy most of the time. My favorite part was that I could not predict the characters and the way certain events would play out. This game is a well-written Dungeons and Dragons campaign, but more importantly, it's well-written because you as the player can't always determine what 'the good' and 'the bad' options are - quite different from every modern RPG I have played. More importantly, the gameplay is fun because your choice of party members and gear really does make the difference between finishing the game and failing at every turn. Unfortunately, the Enhanced Edition commits a sin in trying to change history by creating new characters that do not fit the tone at all. The good writing I mentioned earlier is strictly tied to the original game; the new characters are predictable and an example of typical modern day writing. Luckily, it's easy to mod them out (just google). Besides that though, the Enhanced Edition made the game much easier to learn and handle for a beginner player like me with little changes to the interface. This is streamlining done right in my opinion! Recommended!
This is my first time playing through Sam & Max Hit The Road, and I've gotta say, I'm surprised by how little I had heard of this game up until I came to GOG. This game was really charming and I am very happy that I played through it. That said, it was over far too quickly for me. I beat the game in around 6 hours without a walkthrough and that's because even though the humor may be somewhat adult at times, the game is still designed for children in terms of difficulty. That's not really a problem as I still got stumped two or three times during the game, but I would have compensated for the lower difficulty of the puzzles by having more environments to explore. Still, it was a very memorable game, and I'll treasure Sam & Max Hit the Road as one of my favorite Point & Click adventure games, as I am a huge fan of the comic book-style / cartoony niche of the genre. I rarely laugh at jokes, in-game or otherwise, but Sam & Max got me a few times which surprised me quite a bit. If you think your sense of humor is 'dumb', you enjoy cartoon art styles and character, and you enjoy solving funny, cartoony but definitely logical inventory puzzles, I'd say you should give Sam & Max Hit the Road a shot, even at its low full price of $5.99
I had never played Unreal before up until a week ago. Let me tell you first-hand that no nostalgia is required to have a blast with this game. In fact, I've never had as much of a blast playing a first-person shooter as I did playing Unreal. It's hard to describe what makes it so special, but it's a combination of fun and fast combat, the amazing scenarios, and overall level design, and the satisfying weapons you get to use. Besides that, the game's story is told exactly how a video game story should be: Short intro cutscene, short outro cutscene, and optional short texts you can read in the game if you're interested. There are no breaks from beginning to end, no pretentious attempts at Hollywood-style presentation, nothing. You start the game, and you PLAY. Man, even the expansion was fun, I can't remember the last time I jumped right into the expansion or DLC of a game after beating it, but this was just too much fun. I wish I didn't have to describe Unreal in terms of what problems it avoids and more in terms of what strengths it has, but it's one of those games that just feels perfect as a whole and can't really be broken down into strengths and weaknesses. It's just that pure, that refined, and yet it seems to have been done so effortlessly. This is the game that revived my love for video games just as I was growing cynical and bored with everything. The designers were clearly video game geniuses. 100% recommended if you like FPS games. No way you can't enjoy this. It took minimal google searching and tinkering to play at 1440p and it worked flawlessly, so don't let worries like that keep you from experiencing this. Do it, because I feel like I ripped off everybody by getting this game on sale. This single game is worth more to me than half-- than 3/4s of my video game collection.
Medal of Honor: Allied Assault is a first-person shooter based on World War II (obviously). Nowadays, when players hear that a new FPS game is set in a military scenario, they can get quite apprehensive of the game's quality since these types of games generally tend to be mechanically boring, linear and bland looking games. Sadly, despite what I had heard from fellow players, Medal of Honor fits right into that category despite its age. What you get are a bunch of missions, 70% of which are generic on-foot sections (run to where the compass guides you, kill everyone, blow up objectives), 10% are some gimmick sections (the worst one being a sniper mission) and 20% vehicle sections (point and shoot using a mounted gun, or a tank). Sound exciting? I played through this game on the hardest difficulty and was pleasantly surprised at how difficult it got. Unfortunately, however, this isn't a Doom or Wolfenstein game where a mobile player who manages their ammo wisely can overcome any difficulty eventually. No, this is a game where you simply have to Quick Save before every encounter so that you can memorize the enemies' hidey-holes, only to Quick Load and engage them effectively without losing as much health the next time. On that subject, health is not regenerating (thank God), and there are just enough health pick-ups to get you through the game. It's not all bad, it's just not fun. Are there any fun mechanics to make running and gunning fun? Any fun weapons? Cool scenarios maybe? No. Quite the opposite, in fact! The scenarios may be exciting for war/history-buffs, but gameplay-wise? Being in a tank with tank controls shooting at other tanks is not fun. Trying to find snipers who only show part of their heads far off in the distance behind a roof, only to quick load and snipe them before you lose health is not fun. Keeping a brain-dead AI team alive is also not fun. Boring game, nothing special, and sometimes even frustrating. Not recommended at all.
