I'm not very big into Star Wars nowadays, but after having a blast with Battlefront II and seeing how hype the trailers for Survivor have been I decided it was the perfect time to replay this as I've been meaning to get to it for a while. I also made sure to play it over a month before the sequel comes out to avoid burnout and as I'm sitting here writing this while watching the credits scroll I think that was definitely a smart decision.

That is not to insult this game as I did actually even enjoy it a little more this time around, but there are some pretty big issues I have with it that hold it back for me. For one, the gameplay isn't always the most satisfying. When I first played this game I had virtually no experience with Soulslikes but now I consider them a genre I really enjoy (even if I rarely find the time to play them) and I was able to pick up on more of the similarities this time around. But really its more of a Soulslite and I don't find the implementation of many staples the genre is known for to really compliment this game in meaningful ways. The lightsaber combat is pretty good - the lack of dismemberment disappointing but understandable - but it doesn't really feel as tight or as in depth as I'd expect other games like this to be. Also quite frankly while there is a good amount of enemy types, I found virtually every single one that wasnt a stormtrooper variation to be a huge pain in the ass to fight. Thats not to say that its not fun still and pushing enemies off cliffs will never not be fun, but by the time i reached the final boss I was just pretty over the system in general and ended up dropping it to story mode just to get done with it. Skill issue? perhaps but I know if FromSoft added an easy mode update to all of their games right this moment I would still never go for it. Basically the combat is good but the challenge feels more reliant on being annoying than actually honing skill.

My only other big issue with this is that the PS5 version at the very least is quite buggy. I don't remember if it was this noticeable for my first playthrough on ps4 but there were a whole lot of little things that just kinda got in the way. Once or twice Cal just randomly died for no reason during platforming sections, sometimes in fights where you get swarmed and stunlocked the camera fucked off and made it really hard to see and there were multiple cutscenes with out of sync audio that had to be fixed by closing the game. Another thing thats not really a glitch but a bit bothersome is the huge amount of clipping. The ponchos are stylish (but severely lacking in color options like cmon) and optional but its a pretty big distraction to see Cal's hands and legs phase through them in every cutscene and I wish they put a little more care into that. And this is the game that has multiple different lightsaber holstering animations that have a lot of personality so I really doubt its from a lack of love.

Story wise I think the game is pretty solid. I like the whole cast and it has some pretty good arcs and emotional moments. But it does really suffer from feeling like the first in a series. I am very curious to see where the story goes with Survivor but the story definitely feels a little underwhelming where Fallen Order ends off. Its kinda at a point where the main goal is complete but theres no real setup for how the story will continue and it just doesnt entirely work. Cal is a likeable protagonist and I am looking forward to see what they do with his character, I especially want to see more of Merrin as well. The gameplay loop mostly has you traveling back and forth between planets and there is maybe a bit too much backtracking but there are always new areas opened up so its not like you're replaying the same exact thing again and again. I also found the puzzles to be a lot more enjoyable on this playthrough where I remember them being kinda annoying to begin with. I don't generally like puzzles but the ones in this are pretty well thought out and done so I dont have any complaints about them. Overall despite having some technical issues and some complaints about the story and combat as a standalone this is a really great single player Star Wars game that I'm glad is as successful as it is.

Seeing as its been said that this story is planned as a trilogy I am more than okay with that. I definitely am a little unsure on what the story of Survivor will end up being. My biggest hopes after completing this was for a bigger cast and more of them beyond mostly just staying back at the Mantis but It seems like Survivor is going in a different direction. There is apparently a prequel graphic novel meant to explain what happens inbetween the two games but I ain't paying 15 dollars to read it and so I really just hope they have some good ideas and that they don't give the game an ending that super suffers from middle child syndrome. Beyond that I just hope its a little more polished and honestly it's looking like a big step up in a lot of ways. I'll get back to you in May for my review on that one as well :p

Thanks for reading y'all. Still working on a couple other reviews but can't say when they'll be out. I really appreciate you if you've made it this far. See you next time <3

Nancymeter - 81/100 (oh wow a 2 point increase!!)
Time Played: 14 hours for this playthrough
Trophy Completion - 100%
Game Completion #4 of March
Game Completion #54 of 2023

So far this year I've beaten things like Rogue Warrior, Life of Black Tiger, Orc Slayer, Duke Nukem Forever, Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back and much more of equally nonexistant quality. The Quiet Man? It's worse than all of those.

I will go so far to even say that it is my least favorite game I've ever played. I can't call it the worst game of all time as there are many games that are so broken that its impossible to even beat them. However I genuinely wish this was one of those because the 2.99 I spent on this would of had more use in the fucking blender. From story to gameplay to anything else you can think of that makes up a game The Quiet Man completely and utterly fails at.

So to start, the main concept of the game is that since the main character is deaf the vast majority of the game barring the first and last cutscene is nearly completely silent. Only via a second playthrough do you get the option of experiencing the audio, but more on that in a bit. I do think this is actually a really interesting concept but the abysmal execution makes the entire thing fall apart. Firstly there is no subtitles. This is understandable to a degree as you'd naturally assume the whole point of this "mechanic" is that you don't get to hear or understand anything the main character can't. But it doesn't actually work like that. There's maybe one or two instances in the game where anyone uses sign language. The main character very clearly is at the least able to read lips or something of the sort as in every single cutscene he is capable of having conversations and understanding everything being said to him. So why no subtitles? Why does the game open with a message explicitly emphasizing that there are no subtitles. The whole point of the game just completely falls apart because of this. What's worse is that these cutscenes are pointlessly long slog-fests. The game is thankfully only a couple of hours long but so much of it is just spent in these torturously long completely silent scenes of people just fucking talking. Not to mention extended completely silent scenes of a woman singing and playing piano. There are zero interesting visuals to accompany it either, and the framing and composition for the FMVs makes CW shows look like they were filmed by Roger Deakins in comparison. This is all to say that it is fucking boring as god damn motherfucking shit. This would be a great way to get your kids to go to sleep but honestly letting anyone play or watch this is probably highly unethical. And guess what? Knowing the dialogue and story actually makes this even worse. Im convinced that the whole no subtitles thing to make this as unnecessarily cryptic as possible is entirely to mask the fact that the actual story is fuckass. The new game plus audio thing wasnt even in the original game! It had to be patched in because people were rightfully complaining about how miserable this game is. If I'm being completely honest I did not and will not be fully playing this game again to experience the full story. From what i've heard and seen it is so terrible on a base factor (and so easily to tell so from what you're able to piece together of it in your first playthrough) and I highly doubt any new information could possibly save this game. There is some twists near the end and it takes a weird supernatural turn that's just... like I can't even begin to explain it man its just so stupid. In summary the cutscenes are too long, the story is terrible, and the dialogue only makes it worse. But hey, that's only one half of the game. Surely the actual gameplay is better?

The gameplay of The Quiet Man is arguably a dozen times worse than the stupid ass story. It is janky, unpolished and barebones to a laughable degree. There is basically zero explanation to anything, all you have to go off is a really awful menu that just shows symbols instead of just telling you what the buttons do so you're mostly left to button mashing your way through the whole game. And honestly thats really all you need to do for the most part. It's so poorly put together that you can just spam attack through nearly the entire thing. The enemies are the same couple ones with very minimal variance throughout most of the game. They clip through the environments and don't have transition animations so they often just teleport all over the place. The reused characters is so funny too especially when some are in the FMV cutscenes so its especially noticeable. Also not to insinuate anything but besides like some of the bosses, literally every enemy in this is a minority... so on top of everything else that's maybe not the best look. Despite how stupidly easy it is to just button mash through all of the encounters the game can be randomly hard at times. A big chunk of this is definitely because of how the controls aren't explained at all and you're expected to do certain actions for some enemies but more than this the camera is total garbage and there are multiple instances of cutscenes being flashed on screen during the combat making it hard to even see what's happening. Just as easily as you can stunlock enemies they can stunlock you and your character is very frail. Also like previously mentioned the characters just teleport around between animations so its just a huge clusterfuck of game vomit. Also they have the audacity to have a trophy for beating the game without getting hit, which is really funny.

Yeah, thats kinda all I have to say about this game. There's some other random shit like how bland it looks, like how the death loading screens being your mom/love interest looking at you lovingly. She has nice eyes and a good smile so thats basically the only part of the game I enjoyed more than I enjoy stubbing my toe. Also yeah, the same actress is used for both the main characters mom in flashbacks and as the main characters love interest. I'm not gonna comment further on it, I'm just as confused as you are. There's more I could complain about, endlessly even. But I'm tired of talking about this game lmao. In summary, this game is terrible and It's my least favorite game I've ever completed. It also gets the honor of being the very first game I ever give a 0/100 to, so congrats!

Thanks for reading y'all. Sorry this is only my third review three months in. Typing is just hard lol. I'm working on a Kirby's Return to Dream Land Deluxe and Assassin's Creed Ezio Collection review at the moment so hopefully it won't be too long before you see me again. Take care, don't play this game.

Nancymeter - 0/100
Time Played - too damn much
Trophy Completion - who cares
Game Completion #1 of March
Game Completion #51 of 2023

It's not quite the Doom x Hatsune Miku crossover I was hoping for but its probably as close as we're gonna get...

Hey y'all. I didn't mean for it to be nearly a month before my next review but I guess here we are now. It's not that I haven't been playing stuff either, quite the opposite actually. I've been playing way too much as a matter of fact. So much so the thought of giving all these games a thoughtful Nancyfly review is dreadful. But more on that later

Metal Hellsinger is, well it's Metal Hellsinger. A rhythm based first person shooter. I know at this point thats not quite an original concept but it still feels niche enough to call it unique. I do hope this grows into a genre that can stand on its own and I'd like to see more games like this with a different setting/type of music even. That's kinda the thing about this game. It feels likes it is laying the groundwork to pave the path forward for others like it, but ends up not really feeling satisfactory on its own.

Let's just get this out of the way - not to be disrespectful to everyone who worked on it, but nobody cares about the story. It'll get you from level to level but its largely irrelevant. A pro to it though is that the artwork in the cutscenes is quite pretty. Also gotta hand it to Troy Baker for his voice acting as Paz. I know being all like "woah, the most prolific video game voice actor of our time did a good job!?" is a bit of an eye roll but he pulled his Joel voice out of the closet and cranked it up to Sam Elliott, it's great.

Now onto what the people really care about. The music is, to nobody's surprise, really great. I'm not actually much of a metal fan. I wouldn't listen to it on my own its just not really my vibe. In video games however it does get the blood pumping, and Hellsinger is no exception. The instrumentals are solid but its when you get enough fury for the vocals to kick in where the soundtrack really shines. As for the combat, it's pretty okay. You basically just shoot and move to the beat. There's some limited weapon variety, but for a short game on a budget it does the job. I found the explosive crossbow to be awfully unreliable and the sword never necessary but the others were all fun to use. I basically stuck with The Hounds - dual revolvers - the whole way through. Mostly because I'm partial to revolvers and spinny twirly reload animations. Plus when using their ultimate your character does the same animation where your guns float as Tracer in Overwatch which I thought was funny. What does drag this game down the most is the enemies and bosses. There are definitely a few different enemy types you'll face, but for demons they have pretty mediocre designs and very few of them actually require any significant gameplay changes on your part. You'll fight so many of them, and a good few of the combat arenas last way too long. The game as fun as it is wears thin at about the halfway point. The bosses are also pretty bad. Most of them are just the same monster but with different attacks. Now this makes sense within the story but even with new movesets it just makes all the fights kinda dull (particularly one where you have to constantly wait like 15 seconds for it to reveal itself). I was never excited for or anticipating the next boss battle because I knew itd just be the same lame creature over again. The final boss is actually really cool and I enjoyed that fight a lot. I feel like if more of the fights where on that level or at least more unique this game wouldn't feel nearly as underwhelming as it does.

In the end, Metal Hellsinger delivers on the fun gameplay and good music it promised. My score may be a bit harsh - but I guess I was just expecting it to be a lot more impressive than the final cut. For the studios first game it's a great start and I'm game for a sequel. But I might not remember this one in the morning. Thanks for reading <3

Lil Update: I got the platinum! Also decided to raise the score a little bit. the hounds and music are too good to warrant a 3/5 so as of now its a very low 3.5 :p. Also would like to mention the fact that this is 40 on ps5 but 25 everywhere else is pretty insulting and gross. Just get the ps4 version you wont notice a difference

Bonus! Profile Update!
I have been on a roll so far this year, I've already beaten over 25 games. These have been of pretty varying lengths with a lot of them being quite short. (Here's a list of every one I've done https://backloggd.com/u/Nancyfly/list/games-and-dlc-completed-in-2023/) and i've been going out of my way to play some pretty awful ones too. Most namely Duke Nukem Forever, Rogue Warrior and Life of Black Tiger. Beating so many games just makes reviewing not really viable. This one here has already taken nearly an hour of my time. There's also just the fact that some games I beat I really don't have much to say about. I want the reviews on my profile to be kept to a certain quality standard here on out and some games it's just hard to have enough new to write about I can feel proud of. Trust me, I've tried. There are still a couple games I beat recently that I plan to review - DmC, Gotham Knights (which i may have some controversial thoughts on) and Dark Pictures: The Devil In Me - and I'd like to get those out sooner or later. I also plan to do a full review of every 2023 game that comes out this year that I beat. But I just don't need the pressure of reviewing everything I do and I'm not gonna force myself to continue down that route. That's why I'm working on a new backloggd list where I will do a mini review - just sharing quick thoughts on the games that don't make the cut of a standard review for whatever reason. I hope to have that started by the time I post my next review (it's still quite a lot of writing with all the games I'm behind on lol) and I'll have it linked in my bio and at the end of every review. That way I'll have a way of remembering my thoughts on a game better in the future and anyone who'd like to see what I've been playing in-between big reviews can still get their much needed dose of Nancyfly.

If you read this far, I love you, you are loved. Happy early birthday. Have a good day. Don't forget to brush your teeth. See you next time.

Nancymeter - 68/100
Time Played - 5 hours 56 minutes
Trophy Completion - 100% (Platinum #235)
Game Completion #6 of February
Game Completion #27 of 2023