This game looks like it has a couple of neat ideas, at least it does in the screenshots and the user reviews. Unfortunately, I can't get past the first level due to some game breaking bugs. First bug, and the biggest issue so far, is that occasionally the camera and the controls will unsync. Which means that when I press the forward input, and the the camera is positioned directly behind the character, rather than moving forward, he'll run to the left, or right. In some extreme cases he'll run backwards. This seems to happen when you move the camera during an animation (at least that's my hypothesis). The second bug is just the AI in general. I fired a shot with my unsilenced rifle, in order to lure some guards over to a body which I set a trap on. That part worked just fine, except that every guard in the level was now alerted. I could live with that, it seems like a fair consequence for firing a loud rifle, plus maybe the guards radioed it in and that put everyone on alert. The issue, however, is that all the alerted guards decided that it was high time they acquainted themselves with a variety of impassable objects. Whether it were trees, fences, rock walls, buildings, you name it, and an NPC was very likely running into it and glitching out. The third bug is more of a game design issue, and that's the pinpoint precision grenade tosses from guards. I've been killed a number of times in this game, trying to beat this lousy first level, and every single time it was due to a grenade. If it were real life, I know that the enemy probably wouldn't shout "frag out" and I know that I probably wouldn't see or hear the grenade until it was too late. But this is a video game, and generally it's good to give a player some sort of feedback for these things, especially if the AI is able to identify your exact coordinates and send a care package to your feet. Anyway, that's my review. Don't buy this game.
Fallout 3 was a disappointment to a lot of Fallout fans. Which didn't matter a great deal because it appealed to a new generation of Fallout fans, who think Fallout is all about guns, Nuka Cola and "moral" choices. Fallout 3 was by no means a bad game, a number of the side quests were interesting, and felt somewhat faithful to older Fallout games, D.C looks great and it's incredibly immersive, even if the world is poorly designed. I'm trying to think of the perfect way to describe why Fallout fans were disappointed, but the best I can come up with is: Fallout 3 was stupid. When I say "stupid" I genuinely mean it, I don't mean it as a meaningless insult, I mean the design and the writing is without a doubt, stupid. Fallout 3 was made by a developer that think its audience would be stupid, and they built the game around that core philisophy. The plot, the factions, the characters, they're all incredibly simple. The Enclave are generic bad guys, whose only human moment comes from forks dropped through a grate. The rest of the time they might as well be bricks with guns. The supposed "moral" choices in the game aren't difficult, you don't take a moment to weigh the benefits of nuking Megaton or not nuking Megaton. If you do nuke Megaton there are no consequences as quest essential NPCs like Moira amazingly survive, because Bethesda don't trust the players to remember to do a quest before killing an NPC acciedentally or otherwise. The world scales to you, the player, making sure you never really progress as a character, and also making sure you're never really challenged either. The game holds a safe average between easy and hard, to make it as uninteresting as possible. It's insulting frankly. Whats worse is this philisophy carried onto Fallout 4. It's spreading across the entire industry, and has been for years. But it's apparently working. So I guess I better just start smashing my head against a wall.
Fallout 3 was a disappointment to a lot of Fallout fans. Which didn't matter a great deal because it appealed to a new generation of Fallout fans, who think Fallout is all about guns, Nuka Cola and "moral" choices. Fallout 3 was by no means a bad game, a number of the side quests were interesting, and felt somewhat faithful to older Fallout games, D.C looks great and it's incredibly immersive, even if the world is poorly designed. I'm trying to think of the perfect way to describe why Fallout fans were disappointed, but the best I can come up with is: Fallout 3 was stupid. When I say "stupid" I genuinely mean it, I don't mean it as a meaningless insult, I mean the design and the writing is without a doubt, stupid. Fallout 3 was made by a developer that think its audience would be stupid, and they built the game around that core philisophy. The plot, the factions, the characters, they're all incredibly simple. The Enclave are generic bad guys, whose only human moment comes from forks dropped through a grate. The rest of the time they might as well be bricks with guns. The supposed "moral" choices in the game aren't difficult, you don't take a moment to weigh the benefits of nuking Megaton or not nuking Megaton. If you do nuke Megaton there are no consequences as quest essential NPCs like Moira amazingly survive, because Bethesda don't trust the players to remember to do a quest before killing an NPC acciedentally or otherwise. The world scales to you, the player, making sure you never really progress as a character, and also making sure you're never really challenged either. The game holds a safe average between easy and hard, to make it as uninteresting as possible. It's insulting frankly. Whats worse is this philisophy carried onto Fallout 4. It's spreading across the entire industry, and has been for years. But it's apparently working. So I guess I better just start smashing my head against a wall.
I hadn't played Spore until just a few days ago when it was released on GoG. I spent roughly three hours straight having a fairly good time in the cell and creature sections. The cell section was addicting, and it gave a good sense of progression and it actually felt like Darwinism, I'd have to evolve to handle new threats. It felt fantastic when I finally became king of the pool. This later became a recurring theme, but I wished it had lasted longer. Perhaps with more variety in the threats you encounter and more ways to deal with those threats, kind of like a puzzle game almost. Next was the creature section, which was largely more of the same except with a whole other dimension added onto it. I only dabbled in what was on offer, creating a relatively dangerous carnivore with a simple bite and charge attack, but I saw a number of things which gave me cause to think "I'll try that the next time I play through." The creature section was also quite fun, and it also gave a good sense of progression, although it seemed less like I was evolving to counter disparate threats and more to level up my attacks which quickly became a bit monotonous. The creature creator in this section is truly amazing however, beyond anything even by today's standards. Next was the tribal section, then city, then galactic. I'll lump all of these together as they are by far the weakest parts of the game. Firstly, no more customising your creature, which is understandable from a certain point of view, considering humans haven't drastically evolved (physically) for thousands of years, and you can see they wanted to shift the idea from creature evolution to societal and technological evolution. But there just isn't any. It's three set paths, you can be nice, bad or in between. This "morality" is in every stage, but in the later stages, it's your only choice and each time you play, it feels like you're "evolving" in a very scripted way. I'd pick this up for the first half only.
I'd never heard of Jade Empire until a few months ago when I noticed it on the GoG store. As a massive fan of most Bioware games, I immediately added it to my wishlist and went on to pick it up during the next sale, the game is after all, over 10 years old and a $20 AUD price tag seemed steep especially on my budget. I was horrified by my initial boot of the game, with an almost constant stuttering and a horrendous frame rate, it was barely playable. I was close to returning the game, but I persevered and found a few guides to fixing the performance of the game. After some edits to the .ini and some forceful setting applications via my GPU software, I reduced the performance issues only slightly. Any time my character moves the animation is stuttered and the frame rate drops significantly if I move the camera even at the slightest speed. I feel somewhat nauseous when I play the game at length. After all that work, I refused to go quietly. I continued past a painfully jarring opening sequence, the combat takes some getting used to, especially with the issues I was having. But after a while, I finally felt it was worth it. This game is amazing, the world is beautiful despite the age, not to mention strange and interesting. No game has felt as imaginative since my first time with Morrowind. After getting used to the performance issues, I soon become engrossed in the combat. I try to imagine a version of this game where my character can fly between enemies and perform punches and kicks without stuttered animations and a decent frame rate, but even without that the combat is the most refreshing I have experienced in years. It's a contender for the best combat in any RPG I have ever played. It has all the usual Bioware charm and a fantastically written story. The characters are engaging and the plot itself is extremely well executed. My only lament is that I could not experience what is surely a masterpiece at its full glory, I ask the GoG gods to please right these wrongs.
