Very difficult to rate. Character writing is boarderline non existent beyond your pawn. The actual plot is very mediocre, with themes that have been done better many times over, The concept of enduring and attempting to rid the world on a continuous cylce is nothing new, just as serving as a device for the idea of combating a written out fate is and in regards to free will is definitely not something new as well, and has been done many times just within the last few years.
I do like the ending, it is a great moment seeing your pawn “attain free will”, as well as the brine serving as somewhat of a device for the cycle. But honestly thats really the only upside in terms of story and plot. This story has been done a million times, and within those million times, many of them have done it better.
In terms of gameplay, its not cute to have a game preforming this shit. It’s not quirky to be poorly made. The combat feels smooth at times, but that is the only time this game is smooth. For such a boring landscape for much of the map, and combined with the shit stamina, it is odd for them to promote traveling by foot, I can’t lie the map is pretty pathetic as well, it seems like it should have been bigger and had more content. The unmoored world is cool, the regular world is just regular fantasy, at many times not even very fantasy. There’s like 5 different mobs you can fight on a regular basis throughout the game, and about 4 reskinned bigger mobs with at least 1 or 2 varying attacks.
there’s no value or weight to any mobs. You run down a random corridor and stumble into a “boss” but 90% of the time that shit is irrelevant to anything, and after getting 4000 xp For spending 5 minutes killing this thing I just wonder why I even bothered wasting my time with it. Lets be honest almost every quest in the game sucks and feels irrelevent while you’re doing it. There’s a handful of features that will never be used. What’s the point of even bothering with vvoactions if youre not starting a new playthrough, you’re fine maxing out 1 and just using that.
A real half ass and unfinished game that I don’t believe was ready, and the workers obviously knew this as well. I’m sure there’ll be dlc, but whatever is released is something I’m sure should have been in the game upon release. The ending is good but I’m not
going to fall for it. This game is a movement in the wrong direction for
games as a whole

42/100

While I did this run as a modded playthrough under Reforged, Elden Ring at its core is still the best fundamental gaming experience I've had from this decade. Just such a monumental achievement in every facet of game design that can be imagined. Shit, even when I was frustrated (and it happened often), I still don't think I can ever get an experienced like this from any other developer. Packed to the brim with content in a world so dense & rich that it puts most fully-fleshed narrative titles to shame. On a re-run with a stronger understanding of the lore, the experience of walking through the endgame areas and understanding the circumstances of the world itself and your purpose made these grand, cinematic moments feel all the more moving. With Shadow of the Erdtree on the horizon, I already know that FromSoft will once again prove why they're the best developers in the business. Just real, real gaming.

Palworld is a flawed game that is fun only for a limited amount of time.

Dont get me wrong, this was quite fun to binge over a week with mates. In fact, I could think of nothing else for a good long week except what I will do next in this game. It is also way way way better than anything pokemon offers to a long time fan like me. You feel involved, the game is goofy as hell with dark undertones that work (until they dont). I also appreciate the fact that this is an early access game (from a dev who literally nevers goes out of early access really) and is very full of content by those standards.
But the game is just... dead behind the eyes. Once the novelty wears off, its quite grindy and has seemingly no end goal. There is really nothing except the "paldex" to fill. The battles get repetitive over time. Lets not even mention the creative liberties the devs have taken here, the game becoming a mish mash of mechanics from better games.
It is a great amount of fun for 20-30 hours and maybe it will be fleshed out eventually. Maybe this will be an all timer, the pokemon killer (lol), the go to multiplayer game. It just isnt that yet.
Still I can recommend giving it a try, a novel pokemon (but better) experience as it definitely scratches the itch left behind by lack of good pokemon games in creature collector genre.

ohhhh butits a t-third person cam dialogue splurge cinematic game that doensn't utilise the medium to tell the st-

Look, those games are amazing and all and I love when video games ACTUALLY utilise the unique elements granted by it to tell the story, but I honestly don't care when you have one of the single most fleshed out protagonists in the overall medium getting a phenomenal conclusion. Oh, and having the deuteragonist ALSO share an effective dynamic with said character ? Along with the fact htat the game is just fucking RAWWWWWWW in every way possible?! Man, I do not care how the game is presented and how it's "basically a movie" (which is kind of absurd to me considering there are games that quite literally do NOTHING but try to be a movie). I truly adore this game and it means so much to me, a very potent exploration of fatherhood and positive masculinity that had me tearing up in the end. I'll always love this game.