I have a love/hate relationship with open world games, that genre that blended the freeform/mercenary life of, say, Elite, the missions based of, say, a Wing Commander game and the optional RPG elements (this one has them), mostly because they are games that are very grinding and you end up distracted most of the times. Well, I think it is very difficult to design one as polished as Cyberpunk 2077 in the state that it is now. It does remind, a lot, of GTA4, but it also reminds of every Ubi Soft attempt at this kind of design. And it makes it better. It is still grinding, and maybe overlong, but it is better. It is full of detail, full of throwaway details, full of a plot that intersects everywhere. It is incredibly ambitious and, unfortunately, one of a kind. The gunplay works really well, the rpg elements work well enough, and the hacking/cyberpunk stuff works very well when the game allows it to enter (fantastic in combat, repetitive in hacking, memorable in some story missions). I just wish, sometimes, that it had done some things differently. That one of the better characters did not leave that soon. That the cyber missions were more present. That it was less of a GTA. But still, it is the best you can do with it. And it looks, sounds, and plays incredible.
I have a huge problem with the modern survival and choices matter games, where all of them are just a set of grandiloquent trolley problems that, more than being as subtle emotionally as poking your eye to make you cry, are pure power fantasies, God fantasies, so your actions directly cause deaths for the sake of other actions. It is a kind of game that works for many others, who love how a story develops, but I dislike this kind of narrative manipulation even before it became so popular thanks to that zombie game where kids die. It's like a dungeon master presenting you a framework where everything you do is wrong because "that is real life", which I always found very dishonest. Having said that, I like how it sounds, how it looks, the humour in it.
No Man's Sky was a game I bought after seeing 65daysofstatic presenting the soundtrack in a Sonar Festival years ago, as it looked so epic. And since it was released my main problem with the game is that I am totally misaligned with the majority taste regarding what makes a game appealing, and I really dislike the gameplay loops in here. What did I expect? I expected Starflight, Star Control 2, Captain Commando, and yes, there are bits from those games, but the main gameplay loop is resource gathering and base building. I expected that those were add ons and there was a main campaign that was a bit linear, signposting you to different planets, but the random generation was so powerful that it over. And that's great for most of the people, who love that loop of getting out, gather, go back, etc, but I am more interested in character writing, not a beautiful reskin of the good old Noctis. I see there are many exploration multiplayer campaigns, but again I don't like multiplayer as I don't like to play with random people and I don't like to allocate a specific time for gaming (I have to clean the house, do laundry, go to the gym, cook and in general have an adult life sorry). So... it was not the game for me. But people love it. Aesthetically it's awesome, some of the exploration parts make me want to roleplay hard and get lost in the world, but as soon as I see the mechanics to progress I feel kicked out of that fantasy and just see mechanics and bytes. Absolutely not the game for me, but read the rest of the positive reviews because maybe it is for you.
As easy as its first part, which makes it casual to the point of being able to play it as you watch something on the tv, but also as wholesome and cute. And now with dogs. Still very fun.
I like the games. I liked the Raiden saga before (I played them at the arcades) and the Raiden Fighter games are tight and furious. But what kind of port this is? How come you need a mouse to browse through the menus? How come all the menus show a lag of 5 seconds or more when going to any different option, either game or "options" or "exit"? I respect dotemu a lot and I thank them for bringing back many weird things and all the Silmarils games, but this is the worst port of Raiden I have played in the many, many different ports I have tried. Stay away, not even on sale. I would say that this should not even be sold, at all.
Everspace is a bit hard to define, because it puts a spin on the classic space combat game making it random with persistent upgrades like in Rogue Legacy. That works mostly, as the gameplay is varied and you will never really know what to expect, but the mid game grind gets really really tiresome, as you cannot really speedrun (you really need fuel) so it takes almost an hour to get to the first guardian.
I would gave Riven a 2.5/5 stars. Among the Myst like games it is one of the strongest - the environments look awesome, the sound design is great and the puzzles are as complicated as it says on the tin. Thing is... it is not a kind of game that I like, because I dislike backtracking and all the Myst games consist on backtracking via clicking and clicking and clicking and clicking more to relate some clues to puzzles. There is lot of trial and error, there are many instances of pixel hunting, and in general it consists of puzzles that can be resolved via an algorithm, and if a puzzle can be resolved via algorithm I rather have machines do that puzzle or be paid to code that algorithm. Reviews are generally positive as very few people who disliked Myst got to play Riven, so you know what you get in here. Personally I am more fond of some less ambitious clones like Rhem.
So this is the thing: it's a game that, of all games, reminded me a lot of Elex with its post apocalyptic scavenging world and generally mean characters. Once you get a bit further on it and open up the skill branches it gets better, but then, blam, respawns and RNG in loot that makes this closer to a loot game than an rpg. Going from A to B always means that you will find respawning enemies, and if you like to play stealth like I do, you will find yourself doing the same loop over and over again in a way that I never saw in other open world crpgs like Skyrim, and on the other side of the equation of Elex or Piranha games (which tend to feel empty after a while). I know that there are some people who actively enjoy this loop of the same mechanics over and over again with the same enemies in the same spots just for a slightly different loop, and that may work very well if you like to play in non subtle melee, but stealth games usually work better in tightly designed levels. Having said that, HZD is incredibly beautiful, has many game options to make it play fluidly, the main character is lovely and the first hours are just magical. However, kind of ironcally, makes me want to go back to Elex, even when that game irritated me much much more.
Latest patches were not adopted in GOG, and some bugs reside on the server. This makes the GOG version, as much as we like drm free stuff, undesirable, less updated than the Other version, with known bugs, uglier, and harder to mod. It can work for you, it does not for me. Check the discussions in the game name's forum here for further details.
