If you like turn based CRPGs, regardless of whether you are a Warhammer 40K fan or not, you should try this game. Owlcat has a reputation for developing turn based CRPGs with very good writing and captivating stories, and this game is no different. Now that the balancing issues and the bugs are fixed, an absolute 5 out of 5 for me.
The story, the dialogues, and the choices all carry this little gem of a game. There is also plenty of character customization, crafting and what not. If you play your CRPGs for the story and the choices, then this game is for you. If you are in it for high definition cinematics and childish party members, then go play BG3.
It is at its core a resource management game, where you try to keep the morale of your crew high, while rationing food and heating supplies. Around this core, however, is a gripping story with beautifully written dialog and fascinating characters. Although the gameplay is simple, it is fairly challenging, even though I am no stranger to strategy games. The artistic style, including the pictures and the music, is simply beautiful. It made me really feel the weight of the critical decisions that I had to make.
Short background: Love the original Black Isle games (Baldur's Gate I and II plus Planescape Torment), loved the recent Pathfinder games, especially WOTR. I played and did not care much for the previous two Divinity games from Larian, thought the battles were fun and nothing else noteworthy. Since this game received such a plethora of positive reviews, I have forced myself to keep playing. But I just can't seem to enjoy it. For me, the most important elements in a CRPG are the story and the companions. What makes the story in an CRPG epic is the feeling of uniqueness it bestows upon you, being the focal point of the story (think of the Nameless One in Torment, or you a child of Bhaal in BG 1 and 2). Here, there is very little mystery, very little personal growth, no unique challenges that you face. You are one of many (hundreds, thousands?) afflicted by the same problem. The companions are utterly forgettable. They all have the emotional maturity of children in puberty, displaying extreme reactions to everything you say and do, and for some reason, fall in love with you and want to sleep with you after having conversed just a few times. Again, at no point did I feel like I was investing in a friendly or romantic relationship, where their views of me gradually changed. In short, Baldur's Gate 3 has all the blandness of the Divinity Games, including the annoying inventory management. The game has a lot of voice acting and cinematic scenes. I personally put no value to these, as I do not mind reading a paragraph of text giving the description and my mind then conjuring the images. I also do not like the cartoonish artwork of the game (some other reviewer called it a theme-park atmosphere, which I find very fitting). I guess the game is not for me, which I expected but still wanted to give it a try. The combat is ok, but I would call it a downgrade from the previous Divinity games. Perhaps this is due to the implementation of the DD 5th edition rules.
I waited until the latest patch to buy and play the game and, besides a few minor graphical glitches, did not encounter any bugs. The story is very engaging, the NPCs are well written and have interesting backgrounds, the adoptation of the Cyberpunk lore and atmosphere is, in my view, very well done. The game really makes you feel like you live in a dystopic future. It is a pity that the game launched, just like two of my favorite games: Kotor 2 and Fallout New Vegas, in an extremely buggy state. Those other two games are now, after several patches and with the help of the modding community, true masterpieces in gaming and storytelling. I believe Cyberpunk 2077 will take its place among them once the dust settles... Besides the bugs, common criticisisms of the game that kept me from buying it was the supposedly very shallow open world. Never been a fan of open world games; I play games mostly for their story and the deeper interaction with the main NPCs. Thus, I do not care if you can talk to a randomly generated passerby on the street, enter and look around any procedurally generated room in a random building etc. etc. Nevertheless, in Cyberpunk 2077 on several occasions a mission popped up just by listening to a seemingly random conversation on the streets. So there is some depth to the world, and also while playing, I always had the feeling of traversing in a mega-city with lots of diverse inhabitants. So I cannot relate to those who say the world feels shallow... The combat and the driving are probably not the best, if those things matter to you. The hacking could have been implemented a bit better perhaps... Inventory management is a chore, diversity of weapons and clothing feels superficial... But other than these, this is a great game with an interesting story that made me think about it long after I was finished....
I am not really into detective/adventure type of games, but I was immediately spellbound by the Return of the Obra Dinn. The visuals, the music (absolutely amazing), how characters that you never see in motion can become real people where you care about their fates. An absolute piece of art. Also a lot of fun to play.
First of, I waited until a month after the release of the game to avoid any major bugs and indeed did not experience any gamebreaking issues. The game is still being patched, but the current state is perfectly playable. Second, I found the gameplay to be marginally improved over the first Kingmaker game (which I liked a lot). The addition of the turn-based mode will please a lot of players. The story is totally different, much more epic and grand and kind of less personal, for me still very engaging. The writing is mostly good, the NPCs are mostly good, same as in the previous game. The reviews here are mostly negative. I believe this is mostly due to the amount of bugs the game had at launch. So I would suggest that you focus on the more recent reviews to find out about the current state of the game. Overall, one of the best CRPGs I ever played (over the last 25 years). It was very intensive, included some very cool moments, made me think hard about a lot of the choices I needed to make, and included some crazy difficult fights on an epic scale. These are for me the defining characteristics of a great RPG.
Well, I can say that a lot of effort and creativity went into this game. The artwork is beautiful, the music is good, the voice-acting is professional. The story tries to interact with the player, such that occasionally you get the feeling that your decisions affect the gameworld... But that's about it for me with the positives. The game consists basically two parts. In the first one, you explore the map while collecting resources and engaging with the world in a limited fashion. I found this part to be very tedious. The pathfinding is really poor, so that you have to click click click until your finger is sore. The second part makes up the battles in the form of a card game. I liked Gwent ok in Witcher 3, but here after my n'th card battle this has also become very repetitive. The puzzles with their unique solutions are sometimes interesting but oftentimes tiresome. The game is also pretty long (given its merits). After the second map I just wanted it to be over. The story didn't really strike a chord with me. I found the NPC's that travel with you very one-dimensional and uninteresting. The enemies are of cardboard quality villains. Still, after many "against-all-odds" victories I found myself rooting for the Nilfgaardians (they are the enemy). I think this should have been a game designed for and aimed at moble devices and mobile gaming. It looks nice, but has very limited features and is extremely repetitive. It sells itself (partly) as a role-playing game, but all the decisions I made have consequences which felt extremely arbitrary. At none of my choices was I really able to contemplate future consequences, because what happens next often made me say What?!.
This is a great turn-based strategy game, which is a lot of fun even for people (like me) who are not familiar with the Battletech tabletop game. It's like XCOM Lite with Mechs instead of soldiers. The main campaign has a nice enough story, interesting characters, and decent writing. The game-play is smooth and I haven't encountered any bugs (these were already cleaned out I suppose). There is a very large variety of mechs to play with -- it is true that you won't have a use for lighter, and later, medium mechs as you advance in the game, but this never bothered me and instead felt like natural progression. The battles/missions work technically flawless and I found them to have enough variety: different types of climate/environment, different mission objectives, different types of enemies etc. It could have used a better tutorial though. In the beginning I was overwhelmed with the (partially unexplained) bits of information on the battle screen. Did some reading online and I was fine... I would strongly recommend this game, even if you are not really into giant fighting robots.
What started out as a bland story of "adventurers come together, kill some goblins and then become heroes" turned into a very enjoyable CRPG in its fullest sense. Good parts first: The story becomes richer and more interesting after a dull first part, you have extreme amounts of customization options available to your PC and your companions (the game system is based on D&D 3.5 rule set), unlike many others I found the kingdom management sidegame to be a nice touch, the world and the NPCs are fleshed out enough that you care about their opinions/backgrounds/wishes, and I have not encountered any major or game-breaking bugs (since I started playing when most of the patches and updates were already published). It was a very pleasant (and long) gaming experience, it has been a long time since I have enjoyed a CRPG this much. What I'm neutral about and many others have heavily criticized: the game doesn't hold your hand. In a given map you will be fighting a group of lowly goblins and then within the same map you will encounter a monster so much above your current level that you will be obliterated. So the game expects you to run away from certain fights and then come back to them again when you have grown. Fair enough. The problem is with fatigue when travelling and loading screens and what-not, I do not want to visit the same maps/locations again. There is also no way of adding notes/markers on the map to remind you what you left behind... In its current state this is a gem of a CRPG.
