I like Elex a lot but you have to tear through it. And not just in a "it becomes better after x hours", it never becomes better. You start tearing and maybe last couple of hours you feel like a demigod, but the rest of the game is a struggle. I usually don't like artificial difficulty in games and prefer well designed player strength progression over the hell elex puts you in. Here's why i still give it a positive review: The world took me in instantly. It's a mix of science fiction with lazer guns and robots, fantasy knights in armor with swords and magic and mad max on top of that with drugs, raiders, mutants and ruins of a world long gone. I think the world is a hit or miss, either you like it enough to play or it wont work for you and neither will the rest of Elex. Worldmap was definitely made with love. There are four distinct areas, lots of documents and files about the old world, secrets and just neat things to see. If you loved exploring pre war facilities in fallout this is the game to scratch the itch. Whats so hard about it? Game is not fair, imagine starting an mmo in an endgame area: you suck, your weapons suck, you cant take a hit, everyone is using you for fetch quests and your most reliable tactic is to GTFO at the first sight of danger. Once you realize what part of the food chain you are and accept the rules of this world, elex becomes this weird yet captivating game of rising through ranks, slowly earning the power bit by bit. Elex rewards exploration and using everything that you have at your disposal. But it's... well, it feels not done. Like it's being stuck in early access forever. It's playable, it offers a lot of fun, but be warned about the jank.
Моя единственная претензия к игре - тухлый сюжет абсоолютно не вписывающийся в происходящее. Понятное дело, с релиза уже больше 10 лет прошло, но я так и не понимаю, зачем существуют мисии с задачей "не захватывать и не уничтожать фрейм противника"? У выдающего задания, а так же у игрока нет абсолютно никаких причин не уничтожать или захватывать все чистые фреймы, которые только можно встретить. Особенно смешно это требования недопацифизма выглядит на фоне реалий игры: чтобы выполнить задачу (90% которых - это зарядиться и смыться), игрок просто ОБЯЗАН превзойти натиск врага и перейти в наступление. Если мы уже держим превосходство, так зачем смываться? В результате кампанию можно было бы сократить в двое, с каждым из потерянных фреймов исхода предстоит встретиться по 2-3 раза. В первой игре это было относительно оправдано, империя ищет себе слуг, исход хочет вернуть в лоно заблудших, возврат пытается освободить как можно больше людей. Но здесь нет никаких причин заставлять игрока выпендриваться своим вылекодушием, только чтобы спустя несколько миссий всё равно заставить его уничтожать города. В остальном это такой же периметр, как и первая часть, только всё слабее: саундтрек, дизайн мира, новые юниты, опять же, сюжет. В условиях отсуствия хоть каких-то аналогов сойдёт.
Finally we have some backstory for underrail world without 'i wont tell you this' and 'you wont understand that' bs thats filled major dialogues in the main game. Music got better, writing got a bit better (Ferryman [int] checks are still what average people think smart people talk like, to put it bluntly). The new puzzle is nothing more than a chore if you are crazy on looting everything not screwed to the floor, but thank Ctulhu there is a solver for the puzzle. World is much more interesting, you have more interaction with people and you finally have motivation that original mainstory lacks. New guns, new locations, new mysteries, i will point out again new music is outstanding. To say more about content quality id say this should be the original games ending story. Its massive, it rewards you with knowledge and choice rather than just loot and big healthbar fight. I wont be surprised if people start playing this game, finish expedition before deep cavenrs descend and just end playthought there just because dlc outshines endgame so much. Tl;dr: totally worth your time and money, requires experienced character (level 15 or more, there is a stat checking quest character that wont let underleveled players get to dlc) but its a proper expantion you wont regret buying.
I love f1 and f2. I grew up with those games and adore them. There are many like me who wish for a fallout successor. And some even try to make one. This is obviously a result of one such attempt but the developer forgot that while people love a lot about first two games, theres as much to dislike about them. First of all, everything is heavily randomized. Do you love reloading same save for 10 times because your apparently military trained character misses someone point blank (and therefore has no excuse for it unlike f1 and f2 backstory) and dies because enemies have higher stats than you? Do you like wandering aimlessly between towns in search of doable quests to get xp and level up your skills because you just cant get to the next point sometimes without some stat? Do you absolutely love slow as hell crawling around global map with random encounters that lead to nothing but savescumming? Everything is slow, takes too much time and quikcly turns your playthrough to chore. The descriptions is misleading as well. Dialogues are all the same with dew exceptions and generic skillchecks. Gameplay is linear and limits your freedom of creating any character you want simply because you cant be not a combat specialised char ("but this is a postapoc rpg you should expect lots of fights" - if you think so, please eat a mushroom). Sure you can choose to be one, but it effectively limits your progression. Im suprised by the amount of 5 stars because the product doesnt deserve so much. My guess is people are just hungry for fallout like games and they praise anything that does a decent attempt at recreating the experience even is some of it shoud have never been recreated. It works, probably as intended, but with many questionable decisions made by devs im sure anyone would be better with playing wasteland 2 or jsut replaying f1/f2.
I really like pillars of eternity 1, played it twice but i still have no idea about poe's world and lore and about half of mechanics and i have no intetion of finding out. Tyranny on the other hand estabilishes itself perfectly. The world is smaller, the combat is simplier at first, you have well organised trees of skills and nicely done character stat page. Character themselves are entertaning and original, the world is unsual indeed with you clearly not being the main hero of the tale but important indeed. Tyranny does both talking and fighting and does it good. You have lots of dialogue options that change because of your choices. You have a very talkable teammates who unlike some mad priest dont drown you into obsucated lore. Leaders of two armies under overlords command are so well done you just cant wait to talk mor to them. Fights feel weighty, every animation is smooth and pretty to look at. You even have special moves that can be done only with your party members. Also there are talents, artifacts, scrolls, spell constructor, forge upgrades, unique items in stores and more. Also i have to mention favor/wrath system. They way you deal with various factions and their members affects your standing both with each character and the faction as a whole. Your actions have consequences, you have to think before you say something because it can ruin a relationship you did a big effort of estabilishing. I hope there will be a sequel or more games like this.
Game looks and plays fine, its just you dont have any understanding of whats going on and what you should do. Im good with dices, im not good with full random mode of how many dangers can be at once, how much points they require to fix and what should i do when doing the samea ction sometimes results in a different outocmes. I dont ask for spoonfeeding, just a proper explanation on what to do.
Dying Light is awesome, and i havent tried co-op which might've added another star to the rating. Even so, this game is engaging and entertaining. You learn quickly how to play by its rules and get invested in a working storyline. Animator and modellers did incredible job on making characters look alive, voiceactors too. Hats off to developer for very stable and well running engine, i had only two crushes in my 60hrs of play. Parkour feels great, grappling hook once you unlock it adds more freedom and speed to your movement, melee feels nice, progression is solid (you definitely become stronger, but if you start acting careless, youll die just as fast at level 24 as if your were still level 1). There are some things that were left in the game by mistake, i belive. Firstly: you save only near checkpoints. Secondly: enemies are infinite. I understand that its a big city but still. Third: when you die, instead of loading last save you are moved to nearest checkpoint while keeping everything else in game. So you may be figting a boss, waste tons of ammo and grenades, die because of some stunlocking and while game ressurects you in a nearbie house, it wont give you your ammo back. I prefer classic system but maybe this one will work for you. Music is there to keep you invested: sad yet intriguing at the time of peace, fast and pumping in pursuit\battle. tl;dr: if you want a solid zombie-survival game with a strong emphasis on story and parkour, get it, you wont be dissapointed.
...that brings something new itself. I wanted to give this a 4 star review, but it deserves 5 because the mechanics, the music and atmosphere in this game is incredible. If you missed the sense of rediscovering old world facilities that withold various dark secrets (like Mariposa base and Clan caves) then this game will scratch the itch like nothing else. Not even stalker and metro stood this close. The gameplay is solid, the enemies and situations are vary and interesting to interact with, rpg elementh is there both in dialogues and your character building. You play a a single character with occasional teamups with allied npcs, but 99% of the time its you alone. Game follows the kill-or-steal-or-talk-or-sneak way and suits every char you might want to build, but be ware that combat characters are better suited for surviving the underrail horrors (you cant talk your way out of some monsters mouth) and stealth is THE skill you dont wanna miss unless you like it very hard. I hesitated with 4 stars at first because despite coming addon and various fixes and patches, the game still feels incomplete near the end. It leaves you with many unanswered questions and really cheap and lazy dialogue lines like "i will not explain this plot thing to you because you wouldnt understand anyway" ot "this guy did something horrible but i wont tell what because it doesnt matter" or LITERALLY "you have to do this unavoidable thing because i dont know why but feel so". The game really works once you understand the intentions of the developer, but at the same time it visibly cracks near the end because of the same reason. Still, its worth the full price and many hours of your time.
