Let's say I source the finest quality ingredients and bake a cake with the greatest care and skill. I make fluffy buttercream icing and decorate the cake with elaborate piping and decorations so pretty that you might feel guilty eating the cake. Then it's done and time to serve it. First I scoop out a handful of the cake with my bare hand, then I slap it on a napkin. Then I throw that napkin at you and say "Enjoy!" When you ask for a fork, I give you a straw and tell you to make do. Lost your appetite yet? This is how "Scarf" is presented. Beautiful artwork and music, entertaining gameplay in the style of a meditation, the whole thing oozes charm. Then you try to play it on anything but an absolute powerhouse of a computer, and it's miserably slow. The audio crackles because the system is bogged down trying to run this rotting potato of a game. If the textures and models were breathtakingly realistic or complex, this could be understandable. Some game scenery is especially demanding. But in the present case, it's just a game that was never optimized. The people who can do something about this game don't care enough about it. It's good enough to make some money, and that's what matters.
I read some time ago that the people at Warhorse doubted whether anyone would even care about the idea of a realistic (i.e. based on history and without magic) Medieval RPG. The overwhelming community interest shocked them. We weren't just intrigued by the idea; we loved it. In terms of execution, KC:D is a polarizing experience. If you like the idea of systems you have to understand and you enjoy vast open-world games like those of the Witcher series, this is for you. In contrast to some RPGs, Kingdom Come's first-person perspective and visible player body really ground the player in the environment. There are some oddball things, like brewing a special potion to save your game (humorously reminiscent of Outcast's "gamsav" device). You can't just go wherever you like. Walking around a village at night without a torch will get you in trouble. If you don't have good manners, you had better have quick reflexes. Things are not as harsh as a survival/crafting sim, but this definitely participates in the walking sim and life sim categories. Oh, and in terms of combat and stealth: combat will take practice, and stealth--well, imagine trying to commit real-life burglary. The one gripe I have with the game is that the characters are basically stone-faced. No one in the game has any real facial expression, and I'm perplexed at that, since we've seen titles with expressive characters as far back as Half Life 2. It's a forgivable if bewildering omission. What they didn't forget is a boat load: beautiful scenery including many real-life locations rendered in painstaking detail; voluminous historic lore about characters, places, and customs; a magnificent orchestral score starring performances on period instruments; and detailed artwork binding the elements together into a surprisingly Medieval package. Highly recommended.
The broad-brush, impressionistic pastel world where a cloud of black specks floating in the distance is actually a flock of birds floating on a thermal, or where there you can climb literal mountains to harvest lightning crystals, is an achievement in itself. But what's more impressive is the fact that this game manages to be both evocative and meaningful without trying to convey anything other than the experience and history of the world it creates. Sable is one of those art pieces posing as games, where "fun" is a good word to describe the surface experience, but there is more than fun if you love exploring new places and delving into the deep lore of a place. If there is never a follow-up, be it a "Sable II" or something else in the same universe, that will be a shame, but we still have this. If you haven't played it and you do like open world exploration, jump on the hoverbike and go for a spin.
To say that "Vagrus: The Riven Realms" is text heavy would be akin to saying that water is very wet. This is the mother of all choose-your-own-adventure stories disguised as a game. And a beautiful, if desolate, disguise it is. The interface is elegant and generally easy to use, albeit with a few issues for those of us playing on Steam Deck. That said, it is clearly programmed to support controllers if you don't want to use a mouse or trackpad, and it mostly works that way. If you haven't tried "Vagrus" and you have ever enjoyed pen-and-paper RPGs, this is not a game to miss. It has vivid story-telling, a system that works well delivering that story, and numerous player choices that drive the narrative forward. I especially like games that offer multiple paths to completion (is there really anything that can be called "victory" in such a devastated wasteland?), and the multiple ambitions system does that here. Oh, and it will just about run on a computer powered by a potato battery. That's something of a feat for modern games.
...that there has not been a follow-up to Aer. It's a brief, relaxing low-poly adventure puzzler that feels like it would have served well as a prelude to a larger story. Maybe some day? They finally made a follow up to the movie "Twister", and that worked out swimmingly. So there's hope; one day you might get to show your grandkids Aer 2 and tell them about the oldie that preceded it.
"Fill Fill" is built like a mobile game, in that it is light and small. What surprises me is the sheer number of puzzles. This isn't a title I've heard of, and while at least some of the mechanisms of the game are familiar, the format is a bit different from what I've seen in other similar puzzlers. But with somewhere around 1,200 puzzles in a variety of packs (all included and ready to play), this tiny little puzzle game will provide quite a few hours of enjoyment if you like visual/spatial brain teasers. I ran it on a Steam Deck, and the game started and ran flawlessly. Both the touch-screen control and the mouse/trackpad work well. The challenge of each level is to get the shortest time you can filling out the grid with colored lines that connect all the dots. At $3 minus a penny, it's a reasonable price for a relaxing and enjoyable game.
You already know which way I lean based on the rating I gave, but my statement stands. You will love this game because of what it is, or you will hate it for the exact same reasons: * Murky premise (the story does not hold your hand) * Emphasis on timing and understanding of how to fight and defend against different types of enemies (button mashing WILL NOT WORK; you have to learn to move your character) * Minimalist interface for an RPG (suited to the atmosphere of the game, in my opinion) * Vague expectations (game does not hold your hand; sorry CoD fans) * Creepy "cosmic horror" vibe that blends high technology with arcane, almost spiritualistic lore (seriously, what the **** is going on here?) * Monotonous design reminiscent of Quake (or what Quake might have been if not for financial pressures, Id needing to make money and all) The game runs like a dream on the Steam Deck, and for a clumsy gamer who is not a fan of "Nintendo hard"--like myself--this game is challenging enough but still feels surmountable. And melting the Celestial Beast after twenty attempts is tremendously satisfying. Also, there's a sense of mega-industrial scale to the behemoth of a station on which the game is set. The monotonous design I mentioned is forgivable if you expect something that was designed for the ordinary daily lives of scientists and other regular humans rather than Hollywood spectacle provided by cool-looking supernatural beings. No one would criticize a realistic but boring depiction of the ISS in a game that took place there, because that's a real object that we built. Irid Novo is a vastly scaled-up version of the same thing, albeit one where something terrible has happened that left it a haunted shell of its bustling former self. One bit of advice: if you do take the leap, prefer a high frame rate over beautiful visuals. Fighting is much easier that way.
Watching David Suchet as the quintessential Poirot in the 90's television series, I developed a personal archetype for the self-satisfied yet sympathetic detective with the curly mustache. As much as my wife and I enjoy getting drawn in together in a mystery or exploration game, this was a cozy little piece of the past for us to share. It feels like the guys at Microids and Artefact were CBS fans themselves, because while the art style is deliberately comic-book, the game itself plays like an interactive version of an old "Mystery" miniseries. The only thing that could have improved on it would have been to get David Suchet and Hugh Fraser to reprise their roles as Poirot and Hastings, respectively. Gameplay-wise, it's done in a standard point and click, and it's easy to use and works well. The game mechanisms don't get in the way of play or story. Putting facts together is a fun element as well. All told, it's a delightful presentation of a genuine Poirot mystery.
What can I say? It's Quake 3. It had to pick up all the baggage accumulated by its two superb and well-loved predecessors, and that with a pure and undiluted focus on the intense fast-action multiplayer aspects for which Id had become known. I don't know anyone who thinks that Quake 3 failed to live up to or perhaps exceed the tremendous hype and expectations preceding its release. There are probably people who think that, but I don't know them. If you haven't played Q3A and you have even a modicum of interest in multiplayer entertainment, stop reading and make this purchase. As others have pointed out, the current price ($14.99 regular price at the present time) is not reasonable for a digital copy of a decades-old classic. No biggie, wait for a sale. Though either way, if you play it as much as some of us have, you'll be paying pennies per hour of entertainment.
