I had hopes for an "unrefined gem" here, but unfortunately, this ain't it. I hate almost every aspect of this game; the car physics, the AI, the on-foot controls (especially during combat), the emptiness of the world of things to do and so on. I don't have experience with the Driver series, so I don't want to blame the game for being something it wasn't supposed to, but for me it all comes down to the "heat" system. NYC is nicely designed and there's a certain thrill to putting the petal to the metal driving through it, but the game holds you on a leash; cops will start coming after you if you cross 40-50mph, so unless you're on a timed mission, expect your right hand to cramp up holding that trigger down half-way. Sometimes they'll come after you if your heat is high and you're close to them for too long, if you cross a red light, if you drive to the wrong lane. And they don't let up. Imagine trying to do a quick side-mission and that side-mission takes five times as long, because NYC cops are batshit insane and pull out shotguns for a speeding ticket (insert topical humor here). The system just breaks flow. It doesn't help that the AI is overly aggressive and their cars don't seem to follow the same laws of physics yours does. The zip around like they're on a flying saucer instead of a heavy vehicle. Simply put, the game isn't fun. It's frustrating, it's tedious and it's made specifically to troll your every effort to succeed.
I own this on Steam and I haven't finished it yet, but I've played far enough to give it a glowing recommendation. It's the purest Metroidvania with all the hallmarks and strengths and it's worth every pretty penny. The pacing is great, the level design is intuitive and there's a lot of stuff to do in the game. It's not perfect; there are some minor annoyances with the controls and the hitboxes and some irritating aspects of older Metoidvanias persist. Additionally, the shards are great, but there might be a bit too many of them, the choice can get overwhelming. The best thing about Bloodstained is that it's not an immitation or an homage; it's a pure SOTN follow-up, including years of progress in the genre, made with modern conventions, but without stripping away the familiarity of how this type of game works. The fact that from the first minute you don't miss the Castlevania license at all is a testament to how good this feels to play. It's a culimantion of the improvements older Metroidvanias made and it's absolutely worth your time and money.
(played this on Steam) Abysmal. A LIMBO-inspired zombie apocalypse platformer with some of the worst controls found in the genre, following Bubsy 3D. LIMBO's strength was never in its gameplay; this was apparently lost on the developers, who based Deadlight's mechanics and flow on Limbo (trial-and-error platforming on a wonky physics engine), but forgot to add any of the charm or striking aesthetics. If you make the mistake of picking this up, be warned that you will be required to die a ton and none of it will have anything to do with challenge. You will die, because its trial-and-error design does not provide the necessary hints on how to proceed, until after you've seen yourself impaled on a spike for the 50th time. You will die, because the controls are bottom-tier garbage, on a gamepad no less, with the player character wobbling around every time you need precision. There's nothing for you here, expect frustration and tedium. As if that wasn't enough, the save system of the game is busted. The Continue option keeps loading the wrong level and even though Chapters unlock properly in their dedicated menu, the checkpoints don't; so you better hope you didn't have to quit after a chapter started. No and go away. There is nothing to be gained by playing this, outside of frustration for a short-lived experience that has none of the charm of the game it's mechanically inspired from.
Trashy gunplay, weapons with bad feedback, bullet-spongy enemies, bullet-magnet player to force the bullet time mechanic; all of it to experience a subpar horror story about a little girl. There is a retro charm to it, it shows its age in a good way, both in terms of story and visuals, but don't expect to find a "true classic" shooter or a particularly effective horror experience. Three stars for excellent presentation and the solid level design, the likes of which we haven't seen since the Half-Life 2 era.
Completely unsuitable for anyone not familiar with the first two games. For the rest, it's a mixed bag. Fans will probably get something out of it, a conclusion of sorts, if nothing else. Others may find the game lasts too long and offers too little. Mechanically it's barren and inconsistent; gameplay rules change, the puzzles feel like busywork instead of an integral part of gameplay and a lot of them rely on walking around a lot or retrying several solutions until one sticks, sometimes with no hints or information. Visually it can be glitchy and the texture-work is shoddy, to say the least, but it's a kickstarter-funded project, it was never going to look good. The sound is alright, the voice cast is solid, even if Mark Healy plays 80% of the characters and you can't help but see Vernon Roche all over the world. The story is subjective. As I said, fans will get something out of it. For me, it was a disappointing slog of too many threads that barely tied to one another, characters that barely broke away from their archetypes and a resolution that made me stick to my stomach. Script editors exist for a reason, incidentally. It's better than "Dreamfall: The Longest Journey", but the original game in the series remains the only really good game that's easy to recommend to everyone. Tread carefully with your curiousity.
Unless you're really nostalgic for it, there is no reason to play this. The weapons are floaty, gunplay is chaotic in all the wrong ways, level design is dreadful and overall, the game is just boring. There is no universe in which shooting at aliens with made-up energy weapons should feel like a chore. It's not a matter of difficulty either; the game is challenging in that you get ambushed from all sides by enemies far faster than you, so you need to be careful, but at the same time there is little room for strategy, training your reflexes or simply improvising tactics. It's just a linear slog of a shooter. The original, despite overstaying its welcome and feeling narratively disconnected, is still by far the better shooter of the two.
To start off, this is Gothic 3, only less crap. It's a different story, but has the exact same mechanics and it's a hell of a lot more polished. The thing with Risen is that, to appreciate it, you need to be able to appreciate janky RPGs. This isn't AAA material; but it adds to the charm. It's often in these games you can see some neat ideas that don't get overshadowed by the result of an overbearing budget. So, you're a dude, you wash up on an island; the island is split between a band of bandits and a religious order. Pick your poison, do your side-quests, get to know the world and the characters. The main quest overstays its welcome and the story is forgettable, but between the hero being a jerk and dialogue that really paints a complete picture of the game world, Risen becomes very absorbing. Problems include the lack of variety in the game world and the terrible combat mechanics. There is a delay between input and action and the lock-on system does more harm than good. There are some nifty mechanics for crafting and leveling that carry over from Gothic 3 and the game's better for it. Unfortunately, the game tends to punish multi-classing, so careful with where you choose to spend your learning points. Still, for about half its duration, Risen is totally worth it, if you've enjoyed games like Witcher 1 and Two Worlds. It needs work, skill and overstays its welcome, but for the first 20 hours, you feel part of the world and the evolution of your character is so very organic, it makes it one of the better role-playing experiences of old, despite having a fully-voiced, uncustomizable protagonist.
Never been much of a fan of the Gothic series, but if Two Worlds taught me anything is that there is a lot of fun to be had with low-budget junky RPGs. Gothic 3 is a step-up from its predecessor in that the combat system is *slightly* better and the series really does excell in encouraging exploration and providing a lot of interesting nooks and crannies in its massive world. In many ways, Gothic 3 is a better game in that regard than the Elder Scrolls series. The problem is that the aforementioned combat system really drags the whole game down by a ton. I attempted the game as a hunter/rogue, which worked exactly as I intended to; find a mob, pull enemies, backpedal and shoot until they're down. If they get too close, bust out a sword and run in circles looking for openings. It's a combat style that's oddly absorbing and it's one that I loved in the first Two Worlds. Unfortunately, Gothic 3 lost the plot quickly afterwards and started throwing me in areas swarmed with enemy mobs that hunted in packs, be it wolves, wargs, Orcs or the regular-arrow-immune skeletons. Difficulty in and on itself is never the problem in a game, but when the game becomes repetitive and frustrating is my personal breaking point. Even with quick-saving and multiple attempts, when most of the game time is devoted in pulling and playing happy-slaps with enemy mobs ad nauseum, it's hard to stick with a game just for the exploration and maybe the story. It doesn't help that it's a technical mess. The GOG version is bundled with the previous version of the Community Patch, which makes the game prettier; but crashes still happen and load times are ridiculous for modern systems. I gave up on the game when I just got tired of waiting another 10 seconds of after my millionth death. The game's still fun if you can deal with the above and it has a lot to offer; but it's definitely made for the patient player.
