Mullon
BACKER
2021
All the style in the world doesn't make up for missing gameplay elements, like an attack cancel button, or a way to replay side missions without having to go back to the overworld, or an overworld that's actually interesting.
Why does this series still take place in America, it clearly wants to be in Japan. Unless Suda gets off on Americans talking endlessly about Japan, which I could see. It's like a Yakuza game where Kiryu exclusively talks about American pop culture.
Why does this series still take place in America, it clearly wants to be in Japan. Unless Suda gets off on Americans talking endlessly about Japan, which I could see. It's like a Yakuza game where Kiryu exclusively talks about American pop culture.
If it wasn't for the No More Heroes writing this game would be utterly forgettable. It's a bare bones hack and slash where you run through long, boring corridors swatting at hundreds of forgettable enemies. Your combos are simplistic, at least half of your special attacks are worthless, and the enemies cheap shot you a lot.
2023
It's better than 2 but worse than 3, because dungeon crawling is still less fun and interesting than exploring large overworld maps. Despite the emphasis on multitasking this time I found myself multitasking a lot less than in the previous game because Oatchi, your new companion, is too valuable as a pack mule to separate from and the maps are too small to justify splitting up anyway, while in 3 the large maps and time limit encouraged you to split up the party to get more done in time. And while I know it's not important I'm angry that they retconned the first three games, I hope future Pikmin games take a broad strokes approach to the canocity of all four games.
It's so damn boring. The game has one trick where you turn around and what was behind you before has changed. Nothing's scary, piles of paint are not scary, there has to be a sense of something threatening which there isn't. The story is just a guy going insane, a lazy excuse to have you walk through whatever.
This game is good until it isn't. Building your cult campground is fun and the dungeon crawling is tolerable, but unfortunately you run out of things to build in your cult before you finish the dungeon crawling, making the game a lot less fun. The game is extremely buggy.
Starts off enjoyably moody and atmospheric, but a little too obtuse gameplay wise. Then the story itself gets confusing. It's an alright game, but I wouldn't pay full price for it.
I guess Gears for Breakfast learned from the base game because this is the best level in "A Hat in Time". It doesn't feel unfinished like Subcon Forest, it isn't linear like Battle of the Birds, it isn't empty and boring like Alpine Skyline, it isn't too short like Arctic Cruise, and it actually feels like a realized world with characters and a societal structure. I wish every level felt this thought out and stylistic. My only complaint is that sometimes the branches can still get a little too confusing.
2023
I didn't realize this the first time I played Pikmin 2 on the Gamecube, but this is just the Pikmin 1 maps with a bunch of caves on them. Nintendo pulled a "Tears of the Kingdom", the lazy bastards. The caves are awful, discouraging exploration by being small and tunnel filled, and highlighting the limitations of the game's Pikmin controls by filling them with enemies that have attacks which are harder to move 100 Pikmin out of the way. If you have a choice between playing Pikmin 1 or 2 I would go with 1, exploring is more exciting and there are not caves to pad out the game.
2019
This possibly has the most hours logged on my Steam account so I should probably talk about it. Colony/building sims have always been my addiction, and this one has been the most addictive to me, because the objective to reward drip feed is constant and it is very easy to pick up. The game is always egging you on to build more specific buildings, another school, more farms, a prison, etc., all to watch the two big numbers, your popularity and your treasury go up. You're not so distant from your island that it feels less like a place and more a graph, nor are you expected to micromanage everybody, it's a very good balance, Where the game fails significantly though it informing the player when something is wrong. Suddenly you'll find yourself deep in inescapable debt with no explanation, or your popularity will steadily tick down no matter what you do to satisfy your population's needs, rebel threats will go from none to medium in an instant and never go away. The game is also very bad at explaining it's mechanics, for example how can a house be more efficient or why are criminals on your island is bad from a gameplay standpoint. Tropico 6 is still incredibly addictive, but it could be better.
2021
It has just a few too many permutations, a few too many side challenges and busywork, that tips it over from fun all the time to tedious after a while. Levels having night and day version with different Pokemon to record, great! Levels having multiple paths that you have to all cross to see everything, okay. Different tiers of those same levels with different Pokemon that you have to EXP grind to unlock, that's kind of annoying. Having to take pictures of every Pokemon in four unique positions for it to count as "complete", meh. Having to use four different items that only sometimes work to get those positions, that's just boring.
2022
I would be more forgiving of Wayforward charging forty bucks for reused sprites, reused enemies, reused maps, bad voice acting direction, a largely worthless summon ally system, and tedious fetch quests if there weren't loading screens for every single room, some of which take longer to load than you might actually spend in the room.
2022
You know those old Sierra adventure games where you were screwed if you didn't pick up some random thing at the beginning to solve a puzzle at the end? Ixion is like that in city builder form.
Unlike some other city builders Ixion is divided into levels where your progress carries over. It sucks when after working for twenty hours you realize you simply cannot continue working on your space station because of something you didn't do, or mine, or properly build in the first level, and you have to start all over again.
It's not that this game is difficult, it's that this game is unreasonably difficult. Time limits are razor thin, the AI for the cargo hauling robots is stupid, and even if you memorize the location of all the resources and build everything in the most space efficient way the game might bug out on you and people will refuse to pick up food and starve to death. I just wanted to have fun building a space station, not be penalized for taking too long designing the layout.
Unlike some other city builders Ixion is divided into levels where your progress carries over. It sucks when after working for twenty hours you realize you simply cannot continue working on your space station because of something you didn't do, or mine, or properly build in the first level, and you have to start all over again.
It's not that this game is difficult, it's that this game is unreasonably difficult. Time limits are razor thin, the AI for the cargo hauling robots is stupid, and even if you memorize the location of all the resources and build everything in the most space efficient way the game might bug out on you and people will refuse to pick up food and starve to death. I just wanted to have fun building a space station, not be penalized for taking too long designing the layout.
There should be something called "Other M" syndrome. This game gets rid of all the fun RPG and open world elements of previous games, and for what? Tedious cutscenes and a trite plot. Levels are boring corridors, the fighting moves are basic, and worst of all the bosses are damage-sponges; thank god the Zero version allows save scumming. I'd recommend just watching the new intro and outro cutscenes on YouTube and the credits because the song that plays over the credits is fantastic.
This review contains spoilers
It's more Breath of the Wild. If you liked Breath of the Wild you'll like this.
It doesn't improve upon Breath of the Wild though, which is a problem when Nintendo is charging seventy bucks for the same map. "But it's not the same map," I hear you say, "they changed it and added stuff." It's the same map with a bunch of boring caves and wells in it and a new base at the beginning; I have been through the same library and dining room in Hyrule Castle three times now. The Depths isn't a new map, it's an inverted map of Hyrule with less interesting activities in it, once you figure that out all the mystery dries up. They should have put the all the floating buildings into the ground, that would have made it a new map.
I miss the stasis mechanic. The gluing mechanic is not nearly as fun and is somehow less versatile than stasis plus magnetism. Speaking of which, there's no point in slowly gluing a clumsy vehicle together that runs out of juice or gets stuck on the first obstacle in a minute when there's already horses and teleportation and paragliding.
What the Hell was Calamity Ganon, Ganondorf's fart? This game wants to ride on the success of being a sequel to Breath of the Wild but doesn't want to explore the consequences of the events of Breath of the Wild. It should have been a distant sequel, not an immediate sequel. You have to save Zelda when Zelda should have had Purah's job so she could be more relevant to the story. Ganondorf is built up as a big deal but all his did was stab a lady then spend ten-thousand years in a hole. At least Calamity Ganon messed things up, at least Calamity Ganon was an impressive final boss. I should have known the ending was going to be unsatisfying after finding the end of the Bubbel Gem sidequest unrewarding.
And Hestu's dance is worse this time around.
It doesn't improve upon Breath of the Wild though, which is a problem when Nintendo is charging seventy bucks for the same map. "But it's not the same map," I hear you say, "they changed it and added stuff." It's the same map with a bunch of boring caves and wells in it and a new base at the beginning; I have been through the same library and dining room in Hyrule Castle three times now. The Depths isn't a new map, it's an inverted map of Hyrule with less interesting activities in it, once you figure that out all the mystery dries up. They should have put the all the floating buildings into the ground, that would have made it a new map.
I miss the stasis mechanic. The gluing mechanic is not nearly as fun and is somehow less versatile than stasis plus magnetism. Speaking of which, there's no point in slowly gluing a clumsy vehicle together that runs out of juice or gets stuck on the first obstacle in a minute when there's already horses and teleportation and paragliding.
What the Hell was Calamity Ganon, Ganondorf's fart? This game wants to ride on the success of being a sequel to Breath of the Wild but doesn't want to explore the consequences of the events of Breath of the Wild. It should have been a distant sequel, not an immediate sequel. You have to save Zelda when Zelda should have had Purah's job so she could be more relevant to the story. Ganondorf is built up as a big deal but all his did was stab a lady then spend ten-thousand years in a hole. At least Calamity Ganon messed things up, at least Calamity Ganon was an impressive final boss. I should have known the ending was going to be unsatisfying after finding the end of the Bubbel Gem sidequest unrewarding.
And Hestu's dance is worse this time around.
2023
This review contains spoilers
I got to the point where the expedition was so FUBAR that I had to shoot all the dogs, and I still got a game over on the following cycle. Then the game said I could go back to previous weeks to change the outcome, but I didn't want to go through the same dialogue and morality choices trying to figure out how to keep things from falling apart. It didn't help that the story wasn't what I was expecting, I was hoping for some mystery and adventure in addition to the nature survival, but that's all there was.