2013
By far the best Dead Rising game in my opinion, and quite possibly the most fun zombie game I've ever played.
The infamous deadlines are much more generous than the first games, with a 7 day deadline lasting so long that I beat the game with 2+ days to spare, even while saving every survivor I found (23/25 total), killing every psycho, and spending hours just pissing about.
The amount of zombies on screen is super fun, and the map is a lot more accommodating to faster transportation than the previous games as well, getting around takes a lot less time in general but it doesn't feel too big nor too small.
I never got to play this back on release because I haven't owned an Xbox since the 360 and it's a real shame it hasn't come to PS, but I'm glad I was able to finally play through it on PC. If it ever does come to PS I may even grab it again honestly, great way to kill time.
This game is perfect for playing while watching something on your offscreen as well, I got through most of it in a long weekend while binging TWD in an attempt to catch up before it ends and can honestly say that it was not only addictive the whole time but it was engaging enough that I'd always pause the show to watch the game's cutscenes, which I didn't really expect to care about.
The weapon selection and combinations are at their best in this game also, honestly can't recommend it enough if you wanna just kill zombies. I haven't played 4 yet but having seen the trailers I expect this is the best the series has to offer.
In conclusion, really enjoyed my time with this, only complaints at all are to do with the audio mixing which I think was a me-problem anyway. I s'pose there's a problem with assets popping-in too but frankly idc about that.
If you haven't played this and you have the means to- give it a try :)
The infamous deadlines are much more generous than the first games, with a 7 day deadline lasting so long that I beat the game with 2+ days to spare, even while saving every survivor I found (23/25 total), killing every psycho, and spending hours just pissing about.
The amount of zombies on screen is super fun, and the map is a lot more accommodating to faster transportation than the previous games as well, getting around takes a lot less time in general but it doesn't feel too big nor too small.
I never got to play this back on release because I haven't owned an Xbox since the 360 and it's a real shame it hasn't come to PS, but I'm glad I was able to finally play through it on PC. If it ever does come to PS I may even grab it again honestly, great way to kill time.
This game is perfect for playing while watching something on your offscreen as well, I got through most of it in a long weekend while binging TWD in an attempt to catch up before it ends and can honestly say that it was not only addictive the whole time but it was engaging enough that I'd always pause the show to watch the game's cutscenes, which I didn't really expect to care about.
The weapon selection and combinations are at their best in this game also, honestly can't recommend it enough if you wanna just kill zombies. I haven't played 4 yet but having seen the trailers I expect this is the best the series has to offer.
In conclusion, really enjoyed my time with this, only complaints at all are to do with the audio mixing which I think was a me-problem anyway. I s'pose there's a problem with assets popping-in too but frankly idc about that.
If you haven't played this and you have the means to- give it a try :)
An interesting start, hopefully we don't have to wait too long for the other tapes. The premise is pretty interesting and well-executed for what is it, it's a little less comical than the Sister series, but that's to be expected when the protag is a journalist investigating a murder rather than a teenage girl with no time for bullshit lol
Interested to see where it goes, the Stranga charm is ever-present but it does unfortunately end quite abruptly and send you back to the main menu in an instant which only leans further into making this feel unfinished. Obviously it is, hence Tape 1, but it doesn't feel so much like the end of Act 1 so much as you just finished a certain chapter and closed the book.
Interested to see where it goes, the Stranga charm is ever-present but it does unfortunately end quite abruptly and send you back to the main menu in an instant which only leans further into making this feel unfinished. Obviously it is, hence Tape 1, but it doesn't feel so much like the end of Act 1 so much as you just finished a certain chapter and closed the book.
Please refer to @Nancyfly's review for a more detailed review, our thoughts are largely the same.
Nancy's Review
Only key difference: I had the added benefit of being able to open my inventory but 99% of the time it was only to discard loot and replace it with higher value loot ... This game works really hard to live up to its Looter Shooter genre by just drowning you in dogshit. Level 40 enemies dropping weapons worth 10% of the shit you found in a dirt pile on the way there, very cool.
Nancy's Review
Only key difference: I had the added benefit of being able to open my inventory but 99% of the time it was only to discard loot and replace it with higher value loot ... This game works really hard to live up to its Looter Shooter genre by just drowning you in dogshit. Level 40 enemies dropping weapons worth 10% of the shit you found in a dirt pile on the way there, very cool.
Easily the best of the anthology in my opinion. The usual slow start in the early chapters being prep for a military operation in enemy territory does a great job of not actually feeling like a slow start, and between the rising tension over the initial threat vs the new threat/s that reveal themselves, the game is always throwing curveballs at you to make sure you never feel safe.
The underground setting works perfectly for this style of tense thriller/horror, and the main cast being marines is not only a great way to allow some really cool scenes that are believable and make sense (due to equipment/training..etc) but also enhances the fear of the big bad because if these guys are scared, then I'm fucked.
The larger reveals near the end were just the right amount of horror movie crazy without leading into ridiculous or wacky territory, and the way the story unfolds is superb. Not only do you never feel safe, but every time you think you know what's happening, well maybe you don't know quite as well as you thought huh, punk.
Really happy I got back on this series. I'm not sure if I could say this is as good as The Quarry, if only because that game's cast and runtime allowed for more of the good stuff I like, but this isn't far behind at all for me.
Definitely recommend, if you only play one game from the anthology, make it this one.
The underground setting works perfectly for this style of tense thriller/horror, and the main cast being marines is not only a great way to allow some really cool scenes that are believable and make sense (due to equipment/training..etc) but also enhances the fear of the big bad because if these guys are scared, then I'm fucked.
The larger reveals near the end were just the right amount of horror movie crazy without leading into ridiculous or wacky territory, and the way the story unfolds is superb. Not only do you never feel safe, but every time you think you know what's happening, well maybe you don't know quite as well as you thought huh, punk.
Really happy I got back on this series. I'm not sure if I could say this is as good as The Quarry, if only because that game's cast and runtime allowed for more of the good stuff I like, but this isn't far behind at all for me.
Definitely recommend, if you only play one game from the anthology, make it this one.
2009
I remember trying the free demo for Bayonetta way back in 2009 on my friend's Xbox 360 and, being dogshit at these types of combo-driven hack-n-slash games, struggled with the tutorial alone and left it at that... Fool ;-;
Playing this recently (and more importantly, playing this after DMCV) it definitely feels dated tbh. Which is about as much as I'd expected really, but makes it hard to score any higher because the longer I spent playing it, the more I wanted to get back to the not-playing. Not because it wasn't fun, by any stretch, I just preferred the everything else so much more.
Unfortunately for me, I'm still ass at hack-n-slash games, so I tried my hand at playing this on normal and I wasn't exactly struggling, it just felt like I went down too fast and everything else too slow, so I dropped it to easy in order to move things along a bit. Immediately after, I was having a much better time, feeling cool and less like my time was being wasted. But as I played on it was almost too far on the other end of the scale. My hand was being held so much that it felt like I only had to mash buttons and even bosses would fall in no time at all. To think there's an even easier setting as well!
Another issue I had was that because Easy automatically finishes combos for you, I kept trying to replicate what I was doing on Normal, only for the game to use a different attack pattern that I guess was more appropriate? Just felt like I had a bit less control, in a negative way as well as a positive one.
This is hardly the game's fault, but it's a shame I wasn't able to find a difficulty that was both challenging and fun, hopefully the sequels improve on that.
Aside from the combat, the levels themselves were just, so 2009... On-rails bike levels, an entire level where you're piloting a missile and shooting identical waves of enemies for near 5 minutes, god I really hope they ditch or tone those down as well lol. The set pieces were fantastic I will say, but so much of the game felt drawn out or prolongued and when the levels are only 5-15 mins each anyway they shouldn't really feel like they're dragging. The worst case of this was the final boss, which ends with a far-too-long sequence of just maneuvering something for what must have been 20-30 seconds of avoiding obstacles. The climax was so awesome why drag it out so long!? D':
With that said, Bayonetta is undeniably deserving of its status and following because the characters are just so goddamn lovable. Bayo herself carried the game with ease and the overall campy tone worked perfectly to keep me interested and wanting more from a plot that was honestly just.. I don't even know lol it wasn't exactly confusing but at the same time it felt like there were pieces of information missing that everyone knew but me. I'm gunna have to watch a smarter person explain all the shit I missed, but at the same time credit to the game for making me care regardless of what was going on.
In conclusion, Bayonetta is a PS3 game, and it's got all the rust and clunk to prove it. But nothing can take away from just how charismatic it is. I can confidently say that even though I barely followed the plot and I'm only giving it 4/5 stars, I am absolutely excited to play the 2nd one :)
Playing this recently (and more importantly, playing this after DMCV) it definitely feels dated tbh. Which is about as much as I'd expected really, but makes it hard to score any higher because the longer I spent playing it, the more I wanted to get back to the not-playing. Not because it wasn't fun, by any stretch, I just preferred the everything else so much more.
Unfortunately for me, I'm still ass at hack-n-slash games, so I tried my hand at playing this on normal and I wasn't exactly struggling, it just felt like I went down too fast and everything else too slow, so I dropped it to easy in order to move things along a bit. Immediately after, I was having a much better time, feeling cool and less like my time was being wasted. But as I played on it was almost too far on the other end of the scale. My hand was being held so much that it felt like I only had to mash buttons and even bosses would fall in no time at all. To think there's an even easier setting as well!
Another issue I had was that because Easy automatically finishes combos for you, I kept trying to replicate what I was doing on Normal, only for the game to use a different attack pattern that I guess was more appropriate? Just felt like I had a bit less control, in a negative way as well as a positive one.
This is hardly the game's fault, but it's a shame I wasn't able to find a difficulty that was both challenging and fun, hopefully the sequels improve on that.
Aside from the combat, the levels themselves were just, so 2009... On-rails bike levels, an entire level where you're piloting a missile and shooting identical waves of enemies for near 5 minutes, god I really hope they ditch or tone those down as well lol. The set pieces were fantastic I will say, but so much of the game felt drawn out or prolongued and when the levels are only 5-15 mins each anyway they shouldn't really feel like they're dragging. The worst case of this was the final boss, which ends with a far-too-long sequence of just maneuvering something for what must have been 20-30 seconds of avoiding obstacles. The climax was so awesome why drag it out so long!? D':
With that said, Bayonetta is undeniably deserving of its status and following because the characters are just so goddamn lovable. Bayo herself carried the game with ease and the overall campy tone worked perfectly to keep me interested and wanting more from a plot that was honestly just.. I don't even know lol it wasn't exactly confusing but at the same time it felt like there were pieces of information missing that everyone knew but me. I'm gunna have to watch a smarter person explain all the shit I missed, but at the same time credit to the game for making me care regardless of what was going on.
In conclusion, Bayonetta is a PS3 game, and it's got all the rust and clunk to prove it. But nothing can take away from just how charismatic it is. I can confidently say that even though I barely followed the plot and I'm only giving it 4/5 stars, I am absolutely excited to play the 2nd one :)
2020
A cute lil game with a neat concept of looking inside everyday objects and exploring the memories of those that have passed. The premise and search mechanics are what made this game interesting to me, but hearing the stories of how different people knew and felt about those who had passed was actually rather sweet. How one person could have had such varying impacts on the lives of those around them, likely without often realising it.
Personally I have a very strange relationship with death, I've been fortunate enough to have only really ever lost one relative I was somewhat close to, and my beloved goodest boy Floyd is dearly missed in my heart, but the losses themselves didn't really hit the way it feels like they should've. The relatives I have left that seem to be on their way out aren't met with a feeling of dread or panic, it feels almost heartless but I s'pose my approach isn't particularly emotional... "That's what happens when you reach that age" type deal, ykno. This may sound like I'm pulling at straws, but I guess the point I'm trying to make is that this game helped me understand why that might be. It's cheese but, people aren't really gone, and death - for me - isn't intrinsically a bad or scary thing.
Getting back to the game itself, the only real comment I have is that the ending was a little abrupt, which honestly may be the point, but given how it ends it didn't feel that way to me.
In summary, the game is worth checking out, but the single-mechanic gimmick gets a bit old after a while, especially if you take time to explore for fun. Easy platinum though so if you have a few hours and a couple of quid, this'll do you nicely :)
Personally I have a very strange relationship with death, I've been fortunate enough to have only really ever lost one relative I was somewhat close to, and my beloved goodest boy Floyd is dearly missed in my heart, but the losses themselves didn't really hit the way it feels like they should've. The relatives I have left that seem to be on their way out aren't met with a feeling of dread or panic, it feels almost heartless but I s'pose my approach isn't particularly emotional... "That's what happens when you reach that age" type deal, ykno. This may sound like I'm pulling at straws, but I guess the point I'm trying to make is that this game helped me understand why that might be. It's cheese but, people aren't really gone, and death - for me - isn't intrinsically a bad or scary thing.
Getting back to the game itself, the only real comment I have is that the ending was a little abrupt, which honestly may be the point, but given how it ends it didn't feel that way to me.
In summary, the game is worth checking out, but the single-mechanic gimmick gets a bit old after a while, especially if you take time to explore for fun. Easy platinum though so if you have a few hours and a couple of quid, this'll do you nicely :)
After Man of Medan was somewhat underwhelming, I sorta shelved this title indefinitely and almost forgot the anthology was a thing. I'd buy my mum the games for Christmas each year and she'd say they were 'pretty good' or whatever, and I guess her opinion on this one just didn't sell me lol.
Flash forward a couple years, hot off the back of The Quarry I find myself remembering just how much I enjoy this type of game. The tension when making a decision, the gruesome deaths followed by "nooooo!"s, and the frequent cheating by hitting the pause button to linger on a question just a little longer.. I love it.
Admittedly, Little Hope started out a bit too slow for my liking, the prologue was pretty solid, but the whole unlikely-matchings group walking down foggy roads got quite tiresome. It picked up more as it went along and I found myself really enjoying it once the characters with "barely understandable" (Sheffield) accents made an appearance, but I'd be lying if I said that the ending was just a little bit.. lacking.
Now I didn't manage to get the true ending, so I'm sure I'm missing details as much as I should be, but the ending that I did get didn't do a particularly good job of tying up loose ends or answering many of the questions I had. This was unfortunately a pattern I found, with conversations or events often just sort of, moving on without showing you a proper conclusion. Characters being left alone somewhere only to appear suddenly later, it felt like parts of the game were missing even though my only death was at the climax.
If I had one major comment about why I think the game struggles to be consistent and hold up to the likes of Until Dawn and The Quarry, it's that there are just too many decisions in the first place. Some conversations are made up of 5 exchanged lines and you have to pick a response 3 times in process, it's too easy to misinterpret something or become inconsistent, which can actually have consequences if the characters' personality traits aren't strong enough. The traits thing is a really interesting idea and more choices makes sense for it, it's just a shame it fell a bit short for me.
Anyway, rambles aside, I'm glad I checked this out. It was by no means on the same level as Supermassive's mainline titles, but it definitely wasn't disappointing either. A step up from Man of Medan... Here's hoping House of Ashes is yet another step in the right direction!
Flash forward a couple years, hot off the back of The Quarry I find myself remembering just how much I enjoy this type of game. The tension when making a decision, the gruesome deaths followed by "nooooo!"s, and the frequent cheating by hitting the pause button to linger on a question just a little longer.. I love it.
Admittedly, Little Hope started out a bit too slow for my liking, the prologue was pretty solid, but the whole unlikely-matchings group walking down foggy roads got quite tiresome. It picked up more as it went along and I found myself really enjoying it once the characters with "barely understandable" (Sheffield) accents made an appearance, but I'd be lying if I said that the ending was just a little bit.. lacking.
Now I didn't manage to get the true ending, so I'm sure I'm missing details as much as I should be, but the ending that I did get didn't do a particularly good job of tying up loose ends or answering many of the questions I had. This was unfortunately a pattern I found, with conversations or events often just sort of, moving on without showing you a proper conclusion. Characters being left alone somewhere only to appear suddenly later, it felt like parts of the game were missing even though my only death was at the climax.
If I had one major comment about why I think the game struggles to be consistent and hold up to the likes of Until Dawn and The Quarry, it's that there are just too many decisions in the first place. Some conversations are made up of 5 exchanged lines and you have to pick a response 3 times in process, it's too easy to misinterpret something or become inconsistent, which can actually have consequences if the characters' personality traits aren't strong enough. The traits thing is a really interesting idea and more choices makes sense for it, it's just a shame it fell a bit short for me.
Anyway, rambles aside, I'm glad I checked this out. It was by no means on the same level as Supermassive's mainline titles, but it definitely wasn't disappointing either. A step up from Man of Medan... Here's hoping House of Ashes is yet another step in the right direction!
2021
The combat in this game is very fun and I really enjoyed all the characters and their interactions. The bond moments definitely could've afforded being a bit more spread out so you're not doing 9 of them all at once between endgame chapters, but overall this was a game I couldn't put down.
Side note but to those tempted to play on PS5, the use of the DualSense's features is superb. The feedback and triggers and everything is worked to the bone for basically all of the gameplay, with combat utilising everything in various ways to a point where you can actually feel the flow of the fight and the impact of different attacks, it's dope.
Admittedly, I was somewhat planning to do a more thorough review of this once I'd beat both routes, but I decided to essentially speedrun the 2nd one, and while focussing on farming the gifts at the end and being driven up the wall by over an hour of trying to find 1(one) thing in 3 whole areas thrice over, only to then get one by sheer chance, excitedly use it for the gift I needed and then learn that I actually needed five more for other gifts as Kasane... ugh. Grind trophies suck :(
In conclusion the game is great, I should've just come back to do Yuito's route after a long break but the gameplay loop is so fun and addictive I couldn't stop myself. Definitely recommend to anyone interested, I'll be back to loving it once I've calmed down from my collectible bullshit :p
Side note but to those tempted to play on PS5, the use of the DualSense's features is superb. The feedback and triggers and everything is worked to the bone for basically all of the gameplay, with combat utilising everything in various ways to a point where you can actually feel the flow of the fight and the impact of different attacks, it's dope.
Admittedly, I was somewhat planning to do a more thorough review of this once I'd beat both routes, but I decided to essentially speedrun the 2nd one, and while focussing on farming the gifts at the end and being driven up the wall by over an hour of trying to find 1(one) thing in 3 whole areas thrice over, only to then get one by sheer chance, excitedly use it for the gift I needed and then learn that I actually needed five more for other gifts as Kasane... ugh. Grind trophies suck :(
In conclusion the game is great, I should've just come back to do Yuito's route after a long break but the gameplay loop is so fun and addictive I couldn't stop myself. Definitely recommend to anyone interested, I'll be back to loving it once I've calmed down from my collectible bullshit :p
2022
Really high quality, I'd almost forgotten how much I love these games having not played any since Man of Medan. I've only done one run so far because it's so long, but I really enjoyed my time with this game and basically never felt "safe" when making a decision.
There were a couple of characters whose overall stories were pretty underwhelming, but I'm sure they can play out very differently depending on your actions so it's hard to criticise.
Overall a well written cast with (mostly) likeable characters, the ones I spent most time with all came out of their shells a bit too and I got to learn more which was nice. The plot is good, I liked it. It's got a lot of classic horror tropes and cracks but it's not exactly hiding it's inspiration lol. It's a great time :)
There were a couple of characters whose overall stories were pretty underwhelming, but I'm sure they can play out very differently depending on your actions so it's hard to criticise.
Overall a well written cast with (mostly) likeable characters, the ones I spent most time with all came out of their shells a bit too and I got to learn more which was nice. The plot is good, I liked it. It's got a lot of classic horror tropes and cracks but it's not exactly hiding it's inspiration lol. It's a great time :)
All the charm and style you'd expect from a Stranga game. Admittedly between the timeline and my dreadful memory there were some story beats that confused me a little, but ultimately the locations and characters shine bright.
I'd also had some trouble getting through this because I was too easily distracted for the first couple hours - but once I really switched off and fully to committed to it I couldn't pull away.
I feel like I maybe enjoyed My Big Sister a bit more, but it's hard to tell if that's because I played it in fewer sittings and was less confused by the story :p
Well worth playing if you liked the other games in the series
I'd also had some trouble getting through this because I was too easily distracted for the first couple hours - but once I really switched off and fully to committed to it I couldn't pull away.
I feel like I maybe enjoyed My Big Sister a bit more, but it's hard to tell if that's because I played it in fewer sittings and was less confused by the story :p
Well worth playing if you liked the other games in the series
2016
Short and sweet for this one - much like the game itself. The movement and gunplay are excellent, I personally wasn't a fan of most of the scopes/iron sights but they weren't unusable. I played on Master so I wasn't consistently zipping around doing tricks like I maybe should've been, but when I was able to pull off cool shit in one of my many attempts of a firefight it felt amazing.
The story is forgettable but the relationship between Pilot Cooper and BT, his Titan, was the highlight of the game for me. Did a great job of making us feel like a duo rather than just a mechsuit which I wasn't expecting at all. I'm not normally into mechs to be honest but humanising one definitely appealed to me a lot more (even if they don't give the same treatment to any of the other Titan's you destroy throughout the game... :p)
Anyway overall this was a really good time, glad I played it, my only regret is that - as with Cod 4 MWR - the training course trophy is going to be a huge pain in the dick and - unlike Cod 4 MWR - I really don't think I have this one in me... It's so much harder, at least twice as input heavy and it's twice as long to boot, fuck (:
Update: I did it... Somehow .-.
The story is forgettable but the relationship between Pilot Cooper and BT, his Titan, was the highlight of the game for me. Did a great job of making us feel like a duo rather than just a mechsuit which I wasn't expecting at all. I'm not normally into mechs to be honest but humanising one definitely appealed to me a lot more (even if they don't give the same treatment to any of the other Titan's you destroy throughout the game... :p)
Anyway overall this was a really good time, glad I played it, my only regret is that - as with Cod 4 MWR - the training course trophy is going to be a huge pain in the dick and - unlike Cod 4 MWR - I really don't think I have this one in me... It's so much harder, at least twice as input heavy and it's twice as long to boot, fuck (:
Update: I did it... Somehow .-.
2019
Strangely enough, this game made me realise that the other games in the series were actually better than I'd given them credit for. That's not to say that this entry is bad per se, but it switched things up just enough to make me realise just how much I prefer the way they were before.
For whatever reason, throughout the entire game the weapons felt weak. Even during the tutorial it was taking more shots to put enemies down than it felt like it should've been. Furthermore the lack of marking just makes everything a lot harder than it was probably meant to. In fact a lot of the combat just didn't really feel good at all.
I acknowledge that I played this game "wrong" so I'll make that clear here, this title is very much an attempt at a Far Cry RPG, with the weapons having levels and such with damage that scales accordingly. So by beelining the plot and only doing enough outposts to upgrade my homebase to the required level, I wasn't exactly kitted out by the endgame.
The problem is, through some miracle, neither were my enemies? The penultimate mission sees you fighting the main antagonists - The Twins - and using Level 3 weapons (only 1 shy of the max) it took me an absurd amount of time to kill each of them. Headshots dealing 300 damage and I swear it felt like that had 50,000hp each or something. Not to mention the steady flow of dogs that just appear out of nowhere, grabbing your arm before I could hear them even playing with headphones. But when I finally did kill one and take her weapons, they were level 1? Despite killing me in 4 hits? Bruh
My partner says she had no trouble with this fight at all and that they even went down quickly so this seems to have been my own problem, but idk, I was playing it like a Far Cry game, not like an RPG. Foolish? Maybe. But it hadn't really been an issue until this fight, and it wasn't one for the finale boss either.
That aside, the AI was pretty annoying and this is a really weird thing to mention but the subtitles are so awful. They're not structured at all so any breaks between words or sentences aren't represented. To use an example that hopefully translates well, rather than:
"I'm not trapped in here with you...
You're trapped in here with me" displayed as 2 lines, synced up to the dialogue to show the pause in between them, this game would subtitle it more like:
"I'm not trapped in here with
you. You're trapped in here with me"
and the second line probably wouldn't even show until they were saying the word 'trapped' like bruh
Anyway, besides nitpicking and my own errors the game is alright. I really like the premise of showing Hope County years after the events of 5 but personally for me they changed too much for me to enjoy it nearly as much as I did its predecessor. The twins are fairly interesting and the music/aesthestic is cool, I just couldn't really get into it unfortunately.
For whatever reason, throughout the entire game the weapons felt weak. Even during the tutorial it was taking more shots to put enemies down than it felt like it should've been. Furthermore the lack of marking just makes everything a lot harder than it was probably meant to. In fact a lot of the combat just didn't really feel good at all.
I acknowledge that I played this game "wrong" so I'll make that clear here, this title is very much an attempt at a Far Cry RPG, with the weapons having levels and such with damage that scales accordingly. So by beelining the plot and only doing enough outposts to upgrade my homebase to the required level, I wasn't exactly kitted out by the endgame.
The problem is, through some miracle, neither were my enemies? The penultimate mission sees you fighting the main antagonists - The Twins - and using Level 3 weapons (only 1 shy of the max) it took me an absurd amount of time to kill each of them. Headshots dealing 300 damage and I swear it felt like that had 50,000hp each or something. Not to mention the steady flow of dogs that just appear out of nowhere, grabbing your arm before I could hear them even playing with headphones. But when I finally did kill one and take her weapons, they were level 1? Despite killing me in 4 hits? Bruh
My partner says she had no trouble with this fight at all and that they even went down quickly so this seems to have been my own problem, but idk, I was playing it like a Far Cry game, not like an RPG. Foolish? Maybe. But it hadn't really been an issue until this fight, and it wasn't one for the finale boss either.
That aside, the AI was pretty annoying and this is a really weird thing to mention but the subtitles are so awful. They're not structured at all so any breaks between words or sentences aren't represented. To use an example that hopefully translates well, rather than:
"I'm not trapped in here with you...
You're trapped in here with me" displayed as 2 lines, synced up to the dialogue to show the pause in between them, this game would subtitle it more like:
"I'm not trapped in here with
you. You're trapped in here with me"
and the second line probably wouldn't even show until they were saying the word 'trapped' like bruh
Anyway, besides nitpicking and my own errors the game is alright. I really like the premise of showing Hope County years after the events of 5 but personally for me they changed too much for me to enjoy it nearly as much as I did its predecessor. The twins are fairly interesting and the music/aesthestic is cool, I just couldn't really get into it unfortunately.
I wish I could give this game the lengthy, detailed review that it deserves, but unfortunately my memory doesn't allow for that, so this will have to do.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is a perfect game, held back by it's own perfectionism. It works so hard to make everything feel as good as it possibly can that as a result there's simply too much. It took me over 3 years to complete this, and as someone who can easily bash out a 150-hour JRPG in a month or two, that really says something.
Now obviously I wasn't playing it consistently, not after the first 3 months. But seriously.. 3 months! To reach the Epilogue! For 3 months I played this game - and this was back when I used to pick a single thing and play that in basically all of my free time. Granted I spent a lot of that time doing optional activities, but even considering that the game is just SO, BIG.
I remember coming back after around 6 months and deciding to finally get through the Epilogue one weekend while I was visiting my mum over Christmas. About 15 hours later I'd barely scratched the surface of Part 2. (Yep, that's right. Even the fkn Epilogue is 2 parts long!)
After that, it was a hefty 3 year break, playing for maybe an hour once or twice in between before fully committing to beating it recently.
The point I'm trying to make - quite fittingly in the most roundabout way possible - is that this game is by all means incredible. The attention to detail is unmatched, the cast and story are superb, and the fact that Rockstar did all this to set up RDR1 ... They went so far beyond the call it's laughably impressive.
But alas, it's just too much. I'm giving this game a 5/5 because it absolutely deserves it. But unfortunately Rockstar's tedious game design and absolutely insane scale of everything in it means that I, personally, had to experience it in such a way that by the time the credits rolled, everything prior to the Epilogue was already a fading memory. And that kinda sucks.
I would love to replay this game in a more appropriate way, start to finish without years-long breaks. Maybe some day..
(My gf is definitely gunna make me watch her play it once a year eventually though it's fine huehue)
Red Dead Redemption 2 is a perfect game, held back by it's own perfectionism. It works so hard to make everything feel as good as it possibly can that as a result there's simply too much. It took me over 3 years to complete this, and as someone who can easily bash out a 150-hour JRPG in a month or two, that really says something.
Now obviously I wasn't playing it consistently, not after the first 3 months. But seriously.. 3 months! To reach the Epilogue! For 3 months I played this game - and this was back when I used to pick a single thing and play that in basically all of my free time. Granted I spent a lot of that time doing optional activities, but even considering that the game is just SO, BIG.
I remember coming back after around 6 months and deciding to finally get through the Epilogue one weekend while I was visiting my mum over Christmas. About 15 hours later I'd barely scratched the surface of Part 2. (Yep, that's right. Even the fkn Epilogue is 2 parts long!)
After that, it was a hefty 3 year break, playing for maybe an hour once or twice in between before fully committing to beating it recently.
The point I'm trying to make - quite fittingly in the most roundabout way possible - is that this game is by all means incredible. The attention to detail is unmatched, the cast and story are superb, and the fact that Rockstar did all this to set up RDR1 ... They went so far beyond the call it's laughably impressive.
But alas, it's just too much. I'm giving this game a 5/5 because it absolutely deserves it. But unfortunately Rockstar's tedious game design and absolutely insane scale of everything in it means that I, personally, had to experience it in such a way that by the time the credits rolled, everything prior to the Epilogue was already a fading memory. And that kinda sucks.
I would love to replay this game in a more appropriate way, start to finish without years-long breaks. Maybe some day..
(My gf is definitely gunna make me watch her play it once a year eventually though it's fine huehue)
2004
Hot off the hype of Dragon Quest XI, I figured I'd dive into the earlier games in the series and see where it all began.
Naturally, it's not quite on the same level as XI, but this game holds up surprisingly well if I'm being honest. It's very much a classic JRPG, the map is fairly small and there are maybe 10 enemy types with varying colours but little more. The whole game can be completed using only the D-Pad and A button, but that's to be expected of an NES game.
The combat, like everything else, is incredibly simple. For a time you're best off putting enemies to sleep or stopping them from casting spells, but other than that a standard attack and heal when needed are all you really need.
I'd definitely recommend finding a map online that labels the locations to get an idea of where to go and in what order, I even referred to a level-by-level "guide" as a way of checking if I was ready for a certain enemy or location just yet because - and this is likely the most off-putting aspect of this title - the game forces you to grind.
I joked to my girlfriend early on about this being a 1 hour game with 7 hours of forced grinding, and honestly that's not entirely inaccurate. You can travel to almost anywhere on the map from the very start, but you won't stand a chance in most places unless you've done a bunch of encounters in a lower-level one to buff your stats and save money for better equipment. That very much is the game.
For that reason, this was best experienced (by me) as something to do on the side while working or cooking, just run a few circles and bop a few enemies while attending to something else, worked a charm and made for a nice easy completion for the month :)
The story is just enough to allow the game to exist, the world isn't very "alive" like I praised XI for, nor the characters, but for the first instalment of the franchise there's still enough charm here to keep it enjoyable rather than just tedious.
In conclusion, Dragon Quest is not a phenomenal game, but it doesn't have to be either, well worth trying for the low price. It served me well as a distraction from work and to tide me over while I desperately wait for news on XII...
Speaking of, onto Dragon Quest II :)
Naturally, it's not quite on the same level as XI, but this game holds up surprisingly well if I'm being honest. It's very much a classic JRPG, the map is fairly small and there are maybe 10 enemy types with varying colours but little more. The whole game can be completed using only the D-Pad and A button, but that's to be expected of an NES game.
The combat, like everything else, is incredibly simple. For a time you're best off putting enemies to sleep or stopping them from casting spells, but other than that a standard attack and heal when needed are all you really need.
I'd definitely recommend finding a map online that labels the locations to get an idea of where to go and in what order, I even referred to a level-by-level "guide" as a way of checking if I was ready for a certain enemy or location just yet because - and this is likely the most off-putting aspect of this title - the game forces you to grind.
I joked to my girlfriend early on about this being a 1 hour game with 7 hours of forced grinding, and honestly that's not entirely inaccurate. You can travel to almost anywhere on the map from the very start, but you won't stand a chance in most places unless you've done a bunch of encounters in a lower-level one to buff your stats and save money for better equipment. That very much is the game.
For that reason, this was best experienced (by me) as something to do on the side while working or cooking, just run a few circles and bop a few enemies while attending to something else, worked a charm and made for a nice easy completion for the month :)
The story is just enough to allow the game to exist, the world isn't very "alive" like I praised XI for, nor the characters, but for the first instalment of the franchise there's still enough charm here to keep it enjoyable rather than just tedious.
In conclusion, Dragon Quest is not a phenomenal game, but it doesn't have to be either, well worth trying for the low price. It served me well as a distraction from work and to tide me over while I desperately wait for news on XII...
Speaking of, onto Dragon Quest II :)
I was a little conflicted on what to rate this honestly. Despite my girlfriend's advice I decided to play on Veteran difficulty for my first run (well.. first since I played the original way back on release) and uh, well the difficulty definitely loses more points for this than anything else.
The enemies on recruit come armed with BB guns and no spacial awareness, the enemies on veteran? Oh they come with about 400 frag grenades each and what I can only assume is bulletproof skin. I lost count of how many times I got stuck replaying one checkpoint over and over because they wouldn't go down or stop coming, or I'd be boxed in by so many grenades they might as well have been using clusters. Is this bad level design? Sometimes, absolutely. Is that how the game is intended to be experienced? Hell no.
In the end, trying to set aside all the difficulty bullshit, the levels that are just hallways of enemies, fields with more soldiers than blades of grass, there's really no denying that CoD4 was a huge deal for Call of Duty, and probably for FPS games as a whole.
I feel like everyone in their teens/20s when this came out played it, and for good reason. Hell I have the memory of a dead fish and even I was getting to levels and being hit with nostalgia from the hours I spent getting my ass handed to me on them back in the day. It simply wouldn't be fair to discredit that because I decided to play it on "too hard", right?
Nostalgia aside, this entry has some of the most memorable characters in the franchise, and for better or worse, the most memorable missions as well. All Ghillied Up is one of the very few levels I remember from games of the years this first released, and I can still recall the excitement that I and many others had when first experiencing it. An assassination mission, covert, just you and the charming Cap'n MacMillan in fucking Chernobyl. There is no way to forget that mission really. (Even if One Shot One Kill has the most bullshit finale in FPS history on veteran .-.)
In conclusion, I think this is definitely a solid entry in the CoD franchise, and an enjoyable FPS game overall. It's worth noting that while they share a score I would consider this to be a low 4/5, but the 2019 Remake a high 4/5. (Like 4.0 vs 4.4 honestly lmao)
That's all from me, I may come back for the last couple trophies but I don't think the speedrun Training Course is something I am capable of so the platinum is highly unlikely. Watch this space I guess
(Oh and P.S. Mile High Club on Veteran is dogshit use the exploit unless you're a prodigy)
The enemies on recruit come armed with BB guns and no spacial awareness, the enemies on veteran? Oh they come with about 400 frag grenades each and what I can only assume is bulletproof skin. I lost count of how many times I got stuck replaying one checkpoint over and over because they wouldn't go down or stop coming, or I'd be boxed in by so many grenades they might as well have been using clusters. Is this bad level design? Sometimes, absolutely. Is that how the game is intended to be experienced? Hell no.
In the end, trying to set aside all the difficulty bullshit, the levels that are just hallways of enemies, fields with more soldiers than blades of grass, there's really no denying that CoD4 was a huge deal for Call of Duty, and probably for FPS games as a whole.
I feel like everyone in their teens/20s when this came out played it, and for good reason. Hell I have the memory of a dead fish and even I was getting to levels and being hit with nostalgia from the hours I spent getting my ass handed to me on them back in the day. It simply wouldn't be fair to discredit that because I decided to play it on "too hard", right?
Nostalgia aside, this entry has some of the most memorable characters in the franchise, and for better or worse, the most memorable missions as well. All Ghillied Up is one of the very few levels I remember from games of the years this first released, and I can still recall the excitement that I and many others had when first experiencing it. An assassination mission, covert, just you and the charming Cap'n MacMillan in fucking Chernobyl. There is no way to forget that mission really. (Even if One Shot One Kill has the most bullshit finale in FPS history on veteran .-.)
In conclusion, I think this is definitely a solid entry in the CoD franchise, and an enjoyable FPS game overall. It's worth noting that while they share a score I would consider this to be a low 4/5, but the 2019 Remake a high 4/5. (Like 4.0 vs 4.4 honestly lmao)
That's all from me, I may come back for the last couple trophies but I don't think the speedrun Training Course is something I am capable of so the platinum is highly unlikely. Watch this space I guess
(Oh and P.S. Mile High Club on Veteran is dogshit use the exploit unless you're a prodigy)