Flameyboy928
2017
This review contains spoilers
This review will contain minor story spoilers
L.A Noire is yet another example of Rockstar making exceptional games that do not fall under the GTA umbrella. A fantastic depiction of 1940's Hollywood, playing as a straight edge detective trying not to be compromised by the corruption around him.
To go over the characters/general narrative first, you play as Cole Phelps who is a WW2 vet who begins to rise up the ranks of the LAPD. Cole is an interesting protagonist, his background in the war gives a lot of depth to his character and helps connect him with some of the cases later on in the game. He never exactly has any great character moments and as far as Rockstar protagonists go he is fairly underdeveloped due to the game not really giving moments where we can learn a lot about him. He is an outwardly good person who is tormented by what he saw/did during the war.
The game lacks an overall narrative for the first half of the game until you start the vice desk. The main point of this is that Cole is caught having an affair with a German singer named Elsa and has his name trashed by the corrupt high ups of the LAPD. Next lets look at each desk individually
To start off, i played this game in two sittings, i started it back in August and played through the Traffic desk and Homicide desk before getting burned out at the start of the Vice desk. Recently i came back to it and finished up the Vice desk and Arson desk. I will detail my thoughts of each.
The traffic desk from what i can remember of it was pretty enjoyable, Cole's partner Stefan Bekowsky is probably my favourite of the partners. By the end of the traffic desk him and Cole seemed like friends and they definitely had the best dynamic.
The homicide desk was by far my favourite. The murder investigation is very intriguing and I had the most fun going through these missions. Your partner Rusty Calloway is pretty good, he starts out as the stereotypical drunk asshole detective but he comes around eventually. The mystery in this set of missions makes it a highlight.
The Vice desk in my opinion is the weakest of the bunch. I wasn't really interested in the drug storyline and your partner Roy Earle is an asshole, which isn't bad because he is kinda one of the main antagonists. This desk ends with Cole being demoted after having his affair outed. Which is a good way to keep the pace flowing with some story beats that aren't to do with any case.
The arson desk is pretty good, i found that it switched up the gameplay loop a lot and dropped the almost episodic cases that the previous desks had. The arson desk is all connected and at points even has you playing as a different character. Your partner Biggs on this desk is probably my second favourite because he doesn't do the thing that all the other partners do where they start out an asshole and treat Cole like shit but then by the time the desk ends they end up liking him. Cole and Biggs are amicable with each other from the start which i was glad to see because i was getting tired of the repetition.
To go on to the gameplay, the crime scene sections are really fun with hunting around for all the clues and having to decipher puzzles. The interrogation sections are really fun to but can be difficult due to the faces of the characters being quite hard to read.
Visual wise this game was a marvel for its time, making massive advances in motion capture and the way faces are recorded. It gives an uncanny valley feeling seeing really fluid facial animations on videogame characters. No complaints on this front.
A couple complaints i have are the previously mentioned repetitiveness of the partners, I kinda wish that maybe there was only two partners so that they could be more unique in character. Also I wish that they put more emphasis on the overall story from the start, instead of having it all come out in the latter half. They spend the first two desks setting up the fact that Cole is having an affair with the singer and wait until late into the game to do anything with it. Gameplay wise i think the pacing can be a bit of a problem especially with checkpoints, i wish that there was a restart from checkpoint option because if you screw up an interview or miss a clue you either need to close and reload the game or play the entire case again which is annoying.
While I do not think that LA Noire is in need of a sequel or even a remake, I would love to see more detective games that can take a lot of what LA Noire put out there with crime scene sections and interviews. This is a Rockstar Classic that everyone should play. Highly Recommended
L.A Noire is yet another example of Rockstar making exceptional games that do not fall under the GTA umbrella. A fantastic depiction of 1940's Hollywood, playing as a straight edge detective trying not to be compromised by the corruption around him.
To go over the characters/general narrative first, you play as Cole Phelps who is a WW2 vet who begins to rise up the ranks of the LAPD. Cole is an interesting protagonist, his background in the war gives a lot of depth to his character and helps connect him with some of the cases later on in the game. He never exactly has any great character moments and as far as Rockstar protagonists go he is fairly underdeveloped due to the game not really giving moments where we can learn a lot about him. He is an outwardly good person who is tormented by what he saw/did during the war.
The game lacks an overall narrative for the first half of the game until you start the vice desk. The main point of this is that Cole is caught having an affair with a German singer named Elsa and has his name trashed by the corrupt high ups of the LAPD. Next lets look at each desk individually
To start off, i played this game in two sittings, i started it back in August and played through the Traffic desk and Homicide desk before getting burned out at the start of the Vice desk. Recently i came back to it and finished up the Vice desk and Arson desk. I will detail my thoughts of each.
The traffic desk from what i can remember of it was pretty enjoyable, Cole's partner Stefan Bekowsky is probably my favourite of the partners. By the end of the traffic desk him and Cole seemed like friends and they definitely had the best dynamic.
The homicide desk was by far my favourite. The murder investigation is very intriguing and I had the most fun going through these missions. Your partner Rusty Calloway is pretty good, he starts out as the stereotypical drunk asshole detective but he comes around eventually. The mystery in this set of missions makes it a highlight.
The Vice desk in my opinion is the weakest of the bunch. I wasn't really interested in the drug storyline and your partner Roy Earle is an asshole, which isn't bad because he is kinda one of the main antagonists. This desk ends with Cole being demoted after having his affair outed. Which is a good way to keep the pace flowing with some story beats that aren't to do with any case.
The arson desk is pretty good, i found that it switched up the gameplay loop a lot and dropped the almost episodic cases that the previous desks had. The arson desk is all connected and at points even has you playing as a different character. Your partner Biggs on this desk is probably my second favourite because he doesn't do the thing that all the other partners do where they start out an asshole and treat Cole like shit but then by the time the desk ends they end up liking him. Cole and Biggs are amicable with each other from the start which i was glad to see because i was getting tired of the repetition.
To go on to the gameplay, the crime scene sections are really fun with hunting around for all the clues and having to decipher puzzles. The interrogation sections are really fun to but can be difficult due to the faces of the characters being quite hard to read.
Visual wise this game was a marvel for its time, making massive advances in motion capture and the way faces are recorded. It gives an uncanny valley feeling seeing really fluid facial animations on videogame characters. No complaints on this front.
A couple complaints i have are the previously mentioned repetitiveness of the partners, I kinda wish that maybe there was only two partners so that they could be more unique in character. Also I wish that they put more emphasis on the overall story from the start, instead of having it all come out in the latter half. They spend the first two desks setting up the fact that Cole is having an affair with the singer and wait until late into the game to do anything with it. Gameplay wise i think the pacing can be a bit of a problem especially with checkpoints, i wish that there was a restart from checkpoint option because if you screw up an interview or miss a clue you either need to close and reload the game or play the entire case again which is annoying.
While I do not think that LA Noire is in need of a sequel or even a remake, I would love to see more detective games that can take a lot of what LA Noire put out there with crime scene sections and interviews. This is a Rockstar Classic that everyone should play. Highly Recommended
This review contains major story spoilers
After playing the original i thought i would come back to this game again since i played it through years ago and remember liking it a lot. However after completing it i am left very torn on my thoughts about it.
Start of with what i liked. I think the parkour is as good as ever. Very fluid, improved from the first game and i had lots of fun running around. The combat is massively improved with it being much more involved in the story, however they did remove being able to use weapons which i do think actually works better in this game due to their only being one ranged enemy. I enjoyed most of the characters but none are anything to write home about. Visuals looks great and it also has a pretty good score.
Now for what I didnt like. This game did not need an open world. Now i think them expanding from a linear gameplay loop would of worked ok if the open world was for anything other than collectables. Also when you are running across the same 4 buildings all the time the open world ends up not feeling like one. I was extremely confused by the story, i originally thought it was a sequel to the original due to the futuristic tech, then i looked at the game info and it mentioned "Faith's origin" so then i thought it was a prequel, then to google it and find out its a reboot. The story also handles major plot points very poorly. There are two major example so SPOILERS AHEAD. My main problem is that they reveal that the main villains daughter is actually Faith's sister, not through a cutscene but through a stray line of dialogue said by one of the side characters, for the reveal of the games largest plot point to just be tossed out there like that seems like a massive waste to me. Secondly they have you believe one of the side characters Noah was killed about a quarter of the way into the game, only to reveal he is alive, to then kill him instantly, just seems a bit pointless.
While i think Mirror's Edge Catalyst is a good gameplay experience, with some amazing parkour and way more forgiving combat encounters than its predecessor. I think its step's to take on a more narrative experience failed handing out a half baked story with nothing that memorable really happening.
After playing the original i thought i would come back to this game again since i played it through years ago and remember liking it a lot. However after completing it i am left very torn on my thoughts about it.
Start of with what i liked. I think the parkour is as good as ever. Very fluid, improved from the first game and i had lots of fun running around. The combat is massively improved with it being much more involved in the story, however they did remove being able to use weapons which i do think actually works better in this game due to their only being one ranged enemy. I enjoyed most of the characters but none are anything to write home about. Visuals looks great and it also has a pretty good score.
Now for what I didnt like. This game did not need an open world. Now i think them expanding from a linear gameplay loop would of worked ok if the open world was for anything other than collectables. Also when you are running across the same 4 buildings all the time the open world ends up not feeling like one. I was extremely confused by the story, i originally thought it was a sequel to the original due to the futuristic tech, then i looked at the game info and it mentioned "Faith's origin" so then i thought it was a prequel, then to google it and find out its a reboot. The story also handles major plot points very poorly. There are two major example so SPOILERS AHEAD. My main problem is that they reveal that the main villains daughter is actually Faith's sister, not through a cutscene but through a stray line of dialogue said by one of the side characters, for the reveal of the games largest plot point to just be tossed out there like that seems like a massive waste to me. Secondly they have you believe one of the side characters Noah was killed about a quarter of the way into the game, only to reveal he is alive, to then kill him instantly, just seems a bit pointless.
While i think Mirror's Edge Catalyst is a good gameplay experience, with some amazing parkour and way more forgiving combat encounters than its predecessor. I think its step's to take on a more narrative experience failed handing out a half baked story with nothing that memorable really happening.
2008
Finally got around to this after months of putting it off. I had played the sequel years ago but was excited to come back to the original. It is a short but sweet parkour epic with some great visuals and a really good soundtrack. The story is very much on the backburner as I never really knew what was going on besides looking for Faith's sister. I really liked the animated cutscenes and they were a nice change in art style. Gameplay wise the parkour has aged pretty well, I found a few areas to be poorly marked on where to go and found myself getting stuck in rooms fairly often. The combat hasnt aged well at all and the areas where you have to fight through enemies are extremely difficult even on the lower difficulties.
Defo gonna replay Mirror's Edge Catalyst after completing this. Great fun for a few hours
Defo gonna replay Mirror's Edge Catalyst after completing this. Great fun for a few hours
Picked it up on sale a while ago and only just got round to playing it after i played the original. For the port it adds nice different surroundings for each ending and adds a couple extra things to do. Same game pretty much but its in VR.
For their first game back after going bust, The Expanse is a decent Telltale experience but fails to reach the highs of their previous work.
Gameplay wise is expands on what TellTale were doing with the last season of the walking dead by adding in more gameplay sections that are basically walking around a sandbox while your character talks to people. Nothing too exciting but the gameplay is never what you play TellTale game for.
The story and characters are quite good, nothing that comes close to Lee, Clementine or Bigby but still a pretty decent cast (I had no idea this was apparently based on a show so idk how any characters hold up). Drummer is a pretty good protagonist, her arc consists of the classic tough army person learns to open up to people which is executed quite well. The side characters are nothing special with a couple of exceptions, I quite like Maya's character and her relationship with Drummer is very involved with the story. As for the other side characters they aren't really that memorable im not sure if this will get any further seasons but if so id like to see them come back because there is a lot more you could do with them.
My main criticism is that this game feels like it lacks a lot of dialogue options, in the few sections that contain dialogue options there are only every positive and negative choices where as in previous games they provided a neutral choice or a silent choice. I think that if they cut down on the gameplay sections and provided more interaction with Drummer and the other side characters then you would of got a more complete game.
Im excited to see where TellTale go now that they are back and i am still eagerly awaiting The Wolf Among Us 2 to finally get a release date. The Expanse was a pretty good first outing for them.
Gameplay wise is expands on what TellTale were doing with the last season of the walking dead by adding in more gameplay sections that are basically walking around a sandbox while your character talks to people. Nothing too exciting but the gameplay is never what you play TellTale game for.
The story and characters are quite good, nothing that comes close to Lee, Clementine or Bigby but still a pretty decent cast (I had no idea this was apparently based on a show so idk how any characters hold up). Drummer is a pretty good protagonist, her arc consists of the classic tough army person learns to open up to people which is executed quite well. The side characters are nothing special with a couple of exceptions, I quite like Maya's character and her relationship with Drummer is very involved with the story. As for the other side characters they aren't really that memorable im not sure if this will get any further seasons but if so id like to see them come back because there is a lot more you could do with them.
My main criticism is that this game feels like it lacks a lot of dialogue options, in the few sections that contain dialogue options there are only every positive and negative choices where as in previous games they provided a neutral choice or a silent choice. I think that if they cut down on the gameplay sections and provided more interaction with Drummer and the other side characters then you would of got a more complete game.
Im excited to see where TellTale go now that they are back and i am still eagerly awaiting The Wolf Among Us 2 to finally get a release date. The Expanse was a pretty good first outing for them.
2016
A Vr classic that has shown its age in recent time. Its a quick fun experience with around 3 hours worth of content if you play at a decent pace. The gun combat is good for its time but is the area of the game that is outdated the most, not being able to interact with your weapons. I experienced quite a few visual bugs but nothing game breaking. Its a VR classic that i would only recommend picking up if its on sale
I always was of the opinion that Black Ops 2 was slightly overrated, I never really had the childhood defining experience with this game like the majority of its fans have. But upon replay this game is fantastic and I can happily say that my mind has been changed. The campaign is one of the best in the series and it has 100% rose up in my personal ranking. I love the mix between the past and future setting, Menendez is the second best COD villain behind Makarov. My favourite part is finding all the hidden details to try and get the better endings, it makes me wish that the developers put this much effort into the campaigns these days. One small thing that i found was that the side characters in this game are a lot less prominent than in previous games. Characters like Harper and Salazar have a fraction of the character and screen time of guys like Price, Woods or even the Reboot trilogy Ghost, It makes me think that they knew that these characters where one off's and wouldn't be reused at all.
Campaign set pieces and missions are amazing and this truly holds up as one of the best campaigns.
Campaign set pieces and missions are amazing and this truly holds up as one of the best campaigns.
Replayed the fantastic campaign and it still stands as one of the series' best. The whole host of new iconic characters feel different as apposed to their modern warfare counterparts. Some amazing mission set pieces and of course the fantastic twist at the end which goes down as one of the best of all time however upon replay it is very obvious and I think that if I played this for the first time today I would guess it from a mile off. Never touched the multiplayer or zombies was only really in for the campaign. Personal top 3 campaign
2011
This reminds me of times when EA still put effort into the games they made. This has been sitting in my backlog for a long time and i finally got a chance to play it on my new series X. The championship mode is pretty fun and actually has a semi decent story for it not being the main point of the game. I technically havent beaten it yet because the Issac Frost fight is so unbelievably difficult. I played around with the regular fight mode which was really fun. I love the controls and having the option between buttons and just flicking the stick is really nice for hitting combos. PLEASE EA MAKE MORE GAMES LIKE THIS
2018
Just completed a replay with friends and it is just as fun as the first time. This game has tons of replay value in its base building, we had got to day 45 before exploring majority of the caves and had just spent most of the time building a massive base. Had a blast playing through this again and it is probably number 1 on my list of recommended multiplayer games as it is such a fun multiplayer experience.
While this game does take a lot of the right steps to take Assassins Creed back to what it used to be, there are still a lot of outlying factors that Ubisoft need to ditch for their upcoming entries and a lot of issues that have plagued this franchise long before its recent gameplay shift.
To start off the story is nothing special. Basim is a pretty good protagonist and he is probably the best part of the story, specifically his battle with the Jinni that haunts him in his dreams. The overall narrative lacks a "villain" and instead has 5 faceless people to hunt down which isn't a huge problem but a proper antagonist is something i think the game is missing. Most of the side characters are forgettable because they don't really do anything. Mission wise the game lacks any real set pieces as most of it follows a similar format of find a person in a large fortress. I never saw the "twist" at the end coming but I feel so much better could of been done.
Next up the gameplay. I really didn't enjoy the parkour in this game as it just felt so slow. The combat was also just boring, it got to the point where if there wasn't any enemies that you couldn't parry and insta kill I just didn't bother fighting them. I did however enjoy the stealth as its what I normally went for because I wasn't a fan of the open combat. Technically the game looks really nice playing on the 60 fps mode, and the map was pretty good but all felt a bit similar.
A lot of my issues come down to remnants of the RPG style still in this game, the characters feel like an after thought because none are involved in missions, the inclusion of a stamina bar I think really doesn't work especially when you have enemies that you cant parry and have to dodge. The RPG style on its own is alright but it doesn't work in a game like this where they were trying to make the game like the old ones.
Overall I enjoyed my time with Mirage but I doubt I would ever come back to it. This is a good step in the right direction for the franchise but still it can be improved upon
To start off the story is nothing special. Basim is a pretty good protagonist and he is probably the best part of the story, specifically his battle with the Jinni that haunts him in his dreams. The overall narrative lacks a "villain" and instead has 5 faceless people to hunt down which isn't a huge problem but a proper antagonist is something i think the game is missing. Most of the side characters are forgettable because they don't really do anything. Mission wise the game lacks any real set pieces as most of it follows a similar format of find a person in a large fortress. I never saw the "twist" at the end coming but I feel so much better could of been done.
Next up the gameplay. I really didn't enjoy the parkour in this game as it just felt so slow. The combat was also just boring, it got to the point where if there wasn't any enemies that you couldn't parry and insta kill I just didn't bother fighting them. I did however enjoy the stealth as its what I normally went for because I wasn't a fan of the open combat. Technically the game looks really nice playing on the 60 fps mode, and the map was pretty good but all felt a bit similar.
A lot of my issues come down to remnants of the RPG style still in this game, the characters feel like an after thought because none are involved in missions, the inclusion of a stamina bar I think really doesn't work especially when you have enemies that you cant parry and have to dodge. The RPG style on its own is alright but it doesn't work in a game like this where they were trying to make the game like the old ones.
Overall I enjoyed my time with Mirage but I doubt I would ever come back to it. This is a good step in the right direction for the franchise but still it can be improved upon
Reviewing this in 2 halves, the first two weeks were a blast and had a great nostalgic feeling to them. Playing together with all my friends again felt great. Coming to the end of it now it doesnt have the same feeling for me as it did to start. Dont get me wrong i still love it but i much more enjoy fortnite when its more barebones. Universally the loot pool is great despite the abundance of rocket weapons. I loved the battle pass and having the OG map back is fantastic.
This season is obviously nostalgia bait but seeing how this broke fortnites highest player count proves that it was something that everyone wanted. Will be sad to see it go
This season is obviously nostalgia bait but seeing how this broke fortnites highest player count proves that it was something that everyone wanted. Will be sad to see it go
2019
Such a great and unique take for a puzzle game. I love the narrative as it makes you feel tense and scared throughout. You can really see a lot of influence from the Stanley Parable in the level design and the narrative. Add in some great music to add to the theme and you have yourself a creepy but fun puzzle experience.
2023
I never played the original version but this is such a unique concept for a vr game. It has a great mix of activity to keep you on your toes and a extremely interesting story to keep you enthralled. You can see a lot of influence from games like papers please with the choices you make in the game effecting you home life and the setting of a politically unstable country.
Each actor gives a fantastic performance but two stand outs are that of Jeremy and the prime minister who control the scene every time they are on.
The writing is absolutely fantastic and has some truly hilarious moments. The British deadpan humour is so well executed by every actor especially Paul Baverstock who plays Jeremy
A few complaints i have is that this game would be really slow on replay. There are 6 unique endings with 14 available epilogues depending on choices made. There isnt any fast forwarding or skipping available so you would have to play through the entire game multiple times which would be pretty repetitive. It put me off going for any other endings.
This game is a fantastic Vr experience which i would 100 percent recommend to any fans of either the original game or games with similar themes.
Each actor gives a fantastic performance but two stand outs are that of Jeremy and the prime minister who control the scene every time they are on.
The writing is absolutely fantastic and has some truly hilarious moments. The British deadpan humour is so well executed by every actor especially Paul Baverstock who plays Jeremy
A few complaints i have is that this game would be really slow on replay. There are 6 unique endings with 14 available epilogues depending on choices made. There isnt any fast forwarding or skipping available so you would have to play through the entire game multiple times which would be pretty repetitive. It put me off going for any other endings.
This game is a fantastic Vr experience which i would 100 percent recommend to any fans of either the original game or games with similar themes.
A really enjoyable puzzle experience with enough endings to justify its price. Some of the puzzles are hilariously complex and the endings are really cool as well. I also liked seeing the stanley parable and papers please references. Its currently on sale on steam id 100% recommend it if you are a fan of puzzle games.