I was enthralled with this game through most of the first two chapters. The feeling of weight to what you were doing, the feeling that the game was watching you and reacting to your choices... that is until the cracks started to show. Between the railroaded narrative and the save-scumming, the shine started to fade. Once I saw how little agency you really have, I started to lose interest fast. Read on to see what I mean. The Good: Fantastic graphics despite a somewhat constrained camera, rich roleplaying choices and deep non-player characters highlight a very story-centric game (so much so that there is no room for your own... more on that later). A detailed world filled with life and history. Amazing character customization and deep, weighty combat. This game, at least at first, -seems- like an entirely new type of experience in RPGs. The Bad: A narrative so rich... that there is no room left for your own. You are railroaded through the plot with very little agency. It may seem like you are making weighty choices but you will ultimately end up in the same place. You are forced to be a disgusting *redacted* for the entire game. That plot drives everything you do, and literally nothing you do can relieve you of it. I would prefer an RPG that simply let me be the character I want rather than the one they have written, and built a story that served that aim. Instead, they build the story they wanted to tell and you are shoved through it. The chief conceit of BG2 (being a child of a god) left a LOT more room for agency. Final notes: Save scum or miss a lot of content, most of the romance choices are men, all of the romance choices are non-binary, and next to none are appealing. And wow, they really missed out on a great opportunity with the guardian. In summary: this game has a beautiful wrapper, and if you don't peel it all the way, you will find a lot to like. Unfortunately the plot railroads you, and you receive very little agency in the game.
You're probably wondering why I gave a game three stars that I couldn't actually finish due to bugs that are still present more than a year after release. I'll explain: I had a great time with this game for the majority of my playthrough. And if they fixed the ending that currently displays a black screen that crashes the game, I would have given it four stars. Apparently there are choices one can make in the game that result in an game crashing error during the ending that the developers have known about for more than a year, but have not fixed. As a result, I won't be buying their next module at least until there are assurances that I won't spend 30 hours playing a game that can't be finished. I understand they are a small developer. But I am still paying real money (albeit not very much) for a working product. There should be no combination of options that results in a broken ending in any game released to the public. And in the worst case, that error should be corrected right away, not sat on for a year. Pros: Decent graphics, wonderful implementation of 5e rules, passable atmosphere and world building, straightforward and easy to grasp gameplay, great price, meaningful (though not overly well explained) choices to make Cons: No ending if you should make the wrong choices (and I don't mean from a plot perspective), silly forced diversity in a fantasy world where every general is somehow a muscular woman (honestly more of a problem with the original campaign), occasional bugs like slowdown until you restart the game To sum up, this will be a fun and engaging RPG that I would easily rate four stars if only they fix the ending... eventually.
I thoroughly enjoyed this game when it released. Over the years, though the graphics have aged, it's still a classic horror game that plays smoothly and has a building sense of dread and realism that the more recent games lack. Where the current games are arcade-like and filled with silly bonuses and cartoony effects, this game is more of a first-person version of Dead Space. Pros - Still impressive graphics and lighting model as well as a silky smooth frame-rate (particularly in the BFG edition which has improved textures and effects). A compelling narrative that cuts the line between survival horror and competitive FPS and brilliantly builds tension and dread as you progress. Addictive gameplay that I've personally played through more than a dozen times including the hardest difficulty. Come to think of it, I may be ready for another play-through soon. Cons - It's a little dated and there are a few jump scares. Bottom Line: This is a classic FPS that I wish would have set the tone for later games in the series. Maybe we can get an actual recreation along the lines of Dead Space remake one day, and better yet, a true sequel.
So I had a blast, for a while, playing this game. And further, I really want to like it. The game looks great (although a bit plastic), and the setting is always compelling. How then, you might ask, can I give it two stars? The main reason for my rating is the procedural difficulty. The Pros: Great graphics, great attention to the setting, awesome feel of a giant mech smashing through buildings and other mechs. The game is great fun, for a little while. The Cons: That procedural difficulty. As your character levels up, the game decides to increasingly spam enemies at you in numbers that literally had me in disbelief. Countless, endless enemies no matter the tonnage limit on the mission or what mechs you have at your disposal. This can include vehicles which are not a big deal most of the time, and mechs, which are fun to fight unless you are limping along with a shred of armor from fighting two other groups of four mechs on a 200 ton limit mission and once again have to fight yet another lance that just spawned in along with a dozen vehicles. That's right, your lance of four MEDIUM mechs has to often fight three lances plus vehicles and occasionally artillery (unbelievably annoying artillery that is ALWAYS across the oversized map full of unpassable ridges). It's not as if skill will save you because other than circle strafing it is simply a battle of attrition against your armor (which I always maxed out to no avail). After a point, there are only a couple mission types that are worth playing because of a spawn limit. I will also add that the performance of the game is not very impressive even on my RTX 3080 running in only 1080p. The game often feels sluggish and unresponsive with a tendency to ignore button inputs. In closing, I am disappointed. I had been waiting for this game to come to GOG, and unless there is an update to the difficulty (unlikely as people have been complaining since inception) I will probably seek a refund.
This is a fun, arcade space sim with great controls, excellent graphics and a unique style all its own. If I had to change three things it would be as follows 1) let me create my own character (Juno is fine, but she is a really tired trope at this point) and 2) improve the AI of the enemies rather than trying to overwhelm you with eight opponents at once (more on this later), and 3) let all the ships be more generally available instead of more than half of them locked behind a hidden and somewhat tedious quest chain. Otherwise, this game is awesome. The good: The controls are top notch, and the game's performance is impressive given the minimal specs needed. Some complain about it, but I really like the auto follow feature. It doesn't really aim for you, it just makes it easier to follow your opponents which can get annoying quickly in other titles. Plus, you can turn it off. Also, the graphics are surprisingly detailed when you start paying attention. Guns sheer away chunks of armor, scarring the hulls of capital ships while you are shooting them, space stations might have tree-filled domes, and spacecraft are literally covered with little details. This universe feels lived in. Its a generational improvement over the previous game. I also like the setting and story, even if it's somewhat derivative of Firefly. The universe plays like a western, original star wars, which is fine by me. The not so good: The game can be a big grindy and the best ships are locked behind a completely hidden quest chain that takes place in the Eureka system that you would never know about unless you listen carefully to the in game radio. These ships should be available at more places as they are much more interesting than the standard fair. I also feel that the bounty hunting missions must be gamed as they are unfair with eight enemies hit scanning you. Finally, I would prefer to create my own character. Overall this is a great space shooter that is not to be missed if you enjoyed Freelancer.
I enjoyed MB Warband and played it quite a bit despite never bothering to beat it mostly because I didn't have the time or energy to get all the lords to like me well enough to rule a kingdom. Now we have the sequel. It mechanically improves on the original in almost every way, but suffers from being too tedious and slow to start. Pros: Great, modern graphics at last. The combat is still fun (though little changed from Warband), and the controls on a keyboard and mouse are top notch. I never feel like I am missing a controller. I enjoy the new setting and the fully walkable cities actually look like cities for a change, filled with NPC's you can interact with during quests. Speaking of quests, there are lots of new ones to keep everything fresh and interesting. These might include hunting for a spy with a little detective work, or following a caravan to defend it against an imminent attack. The game is fun, for a while. Cons: I've put in at least 12 hours and I'm still 6th level. Sure, I may be doing something wrong, but I've won at least 50 tournaments, and more battles than I can count. Most of my troops are around 20th-25th level, which is ridiculous. Worse still, the main quest-line is nearly impossible to complete in a reasonable fashion. You have to talk to ten lords throughout the kingdom, but the game doesn't tell you how to find them and you can only locate them one at a time in a specific order when you finally figure out the obtuse system for doing so. And finally, after all of that, its quite common that one of them will be captured by an opposing kingdom, forcing you to loiter around for days or weeks of in-game time waiting for them to escape. It's all very boring, especially once you've done all the quest types and are slowly traveling between cities (you can speed up time, but its still slow). Despite all of this, I believe the game has great potential once they figure out how to create an engaging main quest and cut out the tedium..
