What can I say other than this is a superb sequel, harder than the first, I had to play Rookie a while to get used to it before starting over on 'Normal' and finishing the game quite a bit overpowered. Having done so I decided to try Long War 2, but had some trouble installing the mod, so this is how I did it successfully: 1. Create folder: "XCOM 2/XComGame/Mods" where "XCOM 2" is the path to your installed folder... 2. Extract the "LW_Overhaul" folder from NexusMods Long War 2 zip to the above dir. 3. Add the following line to the file "XCOM 2/XComGame/Config/DefaultModOptions.ini": ActiveMods="LW_Overhaul" 4. For any other mods repeat steps 2 and 3, appending a new line to 3. 5. Delete or rename your "Documents/My Games/XCOM 2" folder before starting the game.
If you want to get thrown into the action be warned! When you get to actually partake in a mission, that's prety good, great sound, graphics and presentation, however after several hours I've only trigged ONE mission so far because of the extreme tediousness of the pointless base sections which basically involve you clicking all over a world map to send your agents to recover information to use in a word-association pinboard puzzle of clues, only to find that when you solve one, you get given another one, again and again and again. After spending over 2 hours doing this clickathon after the first mission I have given-up altogether, it's simply not worth wasting time. The game could have been so much more if these base-building parts were minimal, but as it stands it seems like it's about 75% or more of the game.
I played through in just over 2.5 hours and managed to complete the wager in 75 days. I had pre-conceived ideas about the route that I would take right from the start, but as the story unfolded I realised that the route I thought I would need to take was actually not feasible and so from then on I had to play things by ear, from one destination to the next. It was very entertaining and the choices along the way felt meaningful. I was worried about losing money but I never had to resort to going to the bank at all, and managed to trade my way around without issues, even though I did have to miss some very big paying cities because of the expediency and urgency, which is quite well done, you do really get a sense of having to get a move on and not hang about. There's a high replayability value and I would like to play through it again, with my young nephew or niece next time as I think they'd enjoy it. Be sure to brush up on your geography before playing, especially major world cities as it will help a lot.
I played through just over half the game, which was challenging but eventually it became tiresome with the pixel-perfect multiple actions not going well with the lack of clear perspective of where the character is moving in 3D space. I tried over and over and again on certain rooms, laughing at the sadistic nature of the programmer to make it so difficult in places. In the end I decided "f-this, it's for die-hards" when I got to a level of slippery ice which really took the biscuit with me. I decided that I will just watch a playthrough of the rest of the game on YT instead. What's good? The music, graphics. What's bad? The janky controls and needlessly sadistic difficulty level. Who's this game for? Anyone who wants to be persistently challenged and frustrated from start to finish and doesn't care about the fun.
New to Lovecraft's writings, I read those about Cthulhu and Dagon a few months ago and found that this short, narrated visual novel was a fine realisation of those pages brought to life. A work of art, free to enjoy, for those interested in a century-old classic terror story.
