What a jank fest, for me the disguise system was so bloody annoying in this one, walking ain't the problem, I just get detected by enemies somehow so I just need to spam the load game button each time. Sometimes I feel like the AI gets bugged out and the alerted guards from before loading the game still stay there or something cus they see through my disguise instantly. If they see me from afar 40% of the time they run towards me and that's so annoying, cus if they come close they'll spot me like BRUH. Was really good for half the missions or something, I liked the saints petersburg missions and hated the afghanistan ones. The india one was good but god damn that twist at the end was annoying in terms of gameplay as it got me caught the first time and ruined 5 mins of utter perfection I had maintained till in my last save (I played in expert so only 2 saves). Anyways, I hated the last two missions, so janky and so annoying. The last mission would've been okay if it were possible to stealth it better but nope. And the second last one, YIKES it sucks so much. Still loved the game overall just that it left a bad taste in my mouth. The sound, music and story are great imo just that the gameplay has glimpses of perfection with shitty jank thrown around.

Thief 2014 had a prequel and it was Hitman Absolution lmao.
Honestly though this is not that bad it's just that disguises are absolute trash and don't do the job. Oh what's that, you saw through my disguise, fellow technician, how silly of me! This is the stupidest disguise system yet and Hitman 2's (silent assassin) one was pretty bad to me. The gunplay was pretty damn good imo (only fought when I failed lmao) considering this is supposed to be a stealth game. Yeah it felt like a generic 3rd person military cover shooter of the time but it's still good. Sound design was pretty nice. Story was good at best and a mediocre slugfest by the end, it went on for 2-5 missions too long at the very least. Graphics are pretty nice but holy balls those lens flares!!! SO MUCH BLOOMING HOLY MOLY! Doesn't help that your character has a bald ahh head which shines brighter than the Sun. Anyways, stealth gameplay was pretty "crouch to sneak and use cover or you're fucked" kind of thing. I didn't really like it. The assassinations can be fun but they were awesome back in the day. This is legit a downgrade in terms of the "Hitman" gameplay from all past games except for the first one but even then I'd say if its jankiness were ignored, even the first one had better "Hitman" gameplay. That just ruined it for me, I wish there was more of the using disguises and sneaking around and stuff than here. This game looks so same-ey for the most part that I had to play on the normal difficulty to get the Instinct hints, ain't no way I'm playing without those. I finished the past games with Expert and above for the most part with a handful of Silent Assassin and Professional ratings on the Expert difficulty. I just had a blast exploring those levels. These levels feel tedious without Instinct. Wish this was never included, Detective Mode ahh thing, some clear Batman Arkham inspiration can be seen in everything and the cutscenes just remind me too much of Arkham Asylum's one, similar tone/quality.
Anyways, this ain't a bad game, it's an above average game or at best a "good" game. I think that's the problem, it should stand out from the crowd as something better, like it did back in the day. I don't hate this game, just disappointed. If disguises were better, the cover system wasn't so annoying and the Instinct system wasn't there then this'd have easily been an excellent game. The story focus was annoying cus the story ain't worth it lmao. I really REALLY loved Blood Money's villain, just made sense and was cool af, this 2012 ahh writing was pretty bad and kind of reminiscent of Adam Sandler movies or something where swearing a lot somehow makes you cool or something, jeez the two main villains are so annoying in that regard they have no class and just feel awful but they have such high ranks you're like wtf? a 6/10 game but giving 7 cuz chicks be mad hot in this game, jk I just have a soft spot for Hitman games.

what a game, improves on so much compared to Hitman 2 and then just spoils you with amazing missions, a few missions are kinda bad as always but whichever ones are there are absolutely bonkers good or at the very least slightly bad. But not horrible like some Hitman 2 missions. The most amount of "good" missions in the original series imo, the remakes were great and fun as well though since they are remakes of some poor missions they're great remakes and not great by themselves (except for the last one I liked it). An easy 9/10 though I'd find it a bit difficult to give it 9.5/10 due to its buggy and weird nature. Really like how its disguise system is better and then gets damn near perfected in Blood Money. People who praise Dark Souls 2 for laying the foundations for the later amazing games should look at this first, an awesome game in its own right though with some flaws, and lays solid foundations for the next games to build on. Had an absolute blas

Just shy of a 10/10, a 9.5/10 then, had an absolute blast, story was tight as well. Though I'd say ambitions were reduced a bit in some instances compared to the last games (for the better ig?). Polished enough to be a blast for most people. I really don't know how to feel about this game, the last 2 missions left such a bad taste in my mouth. The last one was an okay or a "good" mission ig but the second last one was awful, I just did NOT like it cus it was tough af for me to stealth. Otherwise? A STELLAR game. I just don't know if I should think of it as a 10/10 or not, yk what fuck it, it's a 10/10, a masterpiece albeit slightly flawed just like everything else in this universe.

A game that aged poorly but one that must be applauded for trying something new and laying the foundations for the incredible games released afterwards. I felt miserable a lot of the times but it was pretty fun going through the levels. The base idea is there, just horribly executed. It's just a "do this thing the way we want you to" simulator, basically an open ocean but one that you must cross on a straight line or go guns blazing to properly complete, the former feels sort of satisfactory and the latter although fun, isn't much satisfying. The story presented here is pretty dang good imo and still knocks my tits off. I would discourage you from trying this game because of its horrible jank and bugs and just a generally unpleasant experience but when it works and you go do the Hitman things, you just feel great. A very good experience at best, a horrible experience at worst and an above average experience overall.

I'm not gonna play this game anymore because it's simply not for me with its jank, puzzles and some non stealth sections. The second mission was good and I could've accepted till then but the third mission, seriously? It's a literal tomb that I'm going to steal from and I didn't sign up for that, I thought this was a stealth game not a tomb raider kind of game so yeah I'm just gonna stop playing the game, maybe I'll come back one day but I don't think I will because it doesn't align with my tastes. I love stealth games and solving STEALTH puzzles, not puzzles in general like a door to a tomb or something.

Rant over, now, if you like stealth games and really like sneaking and also doing a little of tomb raiding, then you'll absolutely love this game. What is undeniable is the sheer amount of stuff you can do in it, the maps are so big that it's dizzying at times and I was scared of stopping a mission midway so that I don't forget the mental map I had. This game tests your senses and allows you to be creative in numerous ways and rewards you with an ultimately very satisfying gameplay. Just because the tomb raiding isn't what I want doesn't mean you won't like it, it's pretty dang cheap so you should most definitely go give it a shot.

I was reminded of Splinter Cell by this game and that means that Splinter Cell was clearly inspired from the breakthroughs in the genre this game made. So I applaud the devs for it, I'm rating the game purely on my experience till the second level and deducting 0.5 stars because of the third one. It is a good game at the very least and an excellent game for most. Music slaps, graphics look okay, sound design is top notch, gameplay is cool af (though admittedly the combat is kinda bad for me, but if you liked skyrim's combat you'll like this one too i think) and map design is phenomenal(ly confusing).

Okay, editing this after a week or so, I've played it again, same as before I loved the first 2 missions, hated the third one and played the fourth one. I think I see why people liked this game but I usually like playing games on hard and this game, bruhh just nope. I ain't doing it. The next mission is "Thieves' guild" and most people seem to hate it so I'm scared of playing that. But yeah after Assassins I understood that mainly it was playing on Hard that was an issue I think. Anyways, the rating goes up from 7/10 to 8/10, I enjoyed Assassins even though the first part was annoying sort of, it must've been revolutionary back then cus nearly every assassin's creed has it lmao. Really dig the game, just think it's a tad bit annoying at times with its complete openness requiring a walkthrough at points like the Mystic soul in third mission or the bloody silver poker in Assassins. I had found the secret library thing as well but not the poker. I hate secrets and weird ahh challenges so that's just me. My tiny brain can't handle this game. You might have fun though so it's definitely recommended. I really liked this for the most part so a very enjoyable experience overall just that some slight jank and annoyances take away from the great experience I was having. Guards sometimes hone in on you like a missile and that's just plain unfair when I'm hiding behind a wall, they're already mad cus of the alarm and then in some loads of the same scenario they stay static and in some they come at your exact direction even if you're hidden behind a wall and they couldn't see you. Weird AI a lot of the times. But still that ain't the issue for me, the problem for me are the objectives themselves and scenarios still. Assassins is a good mission but the poker thing come on 😭. Maybe it's because I'm a zoomer or something idk but I have played some old games and yeah I did see walkthroughs a little but come on, Silent Hill 2 is too good yk. Anyways rant over, sorry Thief fans. If anyone even remotely likes the idea of stealth, sneaking, puzzles and tomb raiding then this game is for you.

Janky af and could've been a really good superhero game but not that fun (at least for me) and I first played it like 10 years ago and so I have some idea of the story and so the story isn't an incentive for me to continue so I just abandoned it.


If you like games where you get to feel super powerful though, this'll definitely be up your alley, otherwise nothing truly special here. Really respect it for not being a generic shooter or something though and for trying something different, I think it is indeed not deserving of anything less than a 6, an above average game.

Ahh a childhood favourite, I was pleased to see that this was NOT worse than what I had remembered. As you can tell, I might be, honestly I most likely am, biased towards this game. The Godfather is a movie that I watched after playing this game and still loved, my top 3 for sure, I just can't seem to find holes in that movie and that's important because this game basically follows that story. So a video game on one of my most favourite films, if not the most favourite, and one I've played when I was little? Of course I'm a little biased to say the least but I'll try to be a bit more objective.

Let's start with the visuals, it's serviceable. I don't know what it is but the faces look so terrifying for the main characters such as Vito Corleone, it's like so uncanny how it moves and stuff, it was revolutionary back then sure but looks sort of terrifying and odd to me, especially when talking. Faces feel less like faces and more like a flat face-shaped object with a flat texture on top, I mean that's what it is but it is very un-immersive. It's not bad but might be considered horrible by some, and I'd say rightfully so. Thankfully every other character is ok like the gangsters or your own characters. I had some buggy visuals like eyes popping out of the eye bags a little, weird mouth movements but that's it. I find it funny how the game handles interactions though, Don Vito has the same animation as Tom Hagen does when you talk to him and I find that funny. I think some Corleone gangsters talk with that animation as well, a bit hunched and then moving their arms. Anyways, this game has some pretty cool animations. I don't mean the quality but rather the variety. Truly well done job from those guys, they didn't give the best quality but they gave so much that it's immersive in that sense. For example, when interrogating someone your character can put his hands up in a fighting stance, grab the other guy, slap them or hold their throat and threaten them. All this variation just adds to the experience. The monotonous designs of the rival gangsters is contrasted wonderfully by the different shop owners and racket owners. I felt like most were different. They had different voices from time to time, different clothes and surprisingly different body and faces as well. I really appreciated that, felt like I was going to a new place instead of an old one. The dialogue is kind of funny sometimes and quite cool when talking with these shop keepers. It's not masterful, deep stuff. Just some cool gangsta shit kinda thing. I love it, fulfills my fantasy. Cars look okay but they don't have translucency, so you can't see who's inside. Original movie scenes are obviously not done justice with these graphics and subpar animations. The gangsters look so similar I think there's only two types, a thin one and a fat one. That's it, they wear different colored inner shirts and that's all the variety in visuals. Animations for execution and the variety are amazing I'd say. You'll have fun killing people in different ways and trying out different weapons for executions and stuff.

Now for the sound. The main issue I have is the music, surprisingly, it's just so much of the same thing. It takes the main Godfather theme and repeats it on and on and on and has some variations of it. If there's like 20 tracks, 12 are the Godfather theme and its variations and those are played most of the time. I'm not looking up how many tracks there are and finding out exactly, I'm just giving a rough idea. The dialogue delivery apart from Tom Hagen is above average. I had fun listening to stuff but it wasn't because the dialogue was great or the delivery was great, it was just a combination of everything. If I'm being objective, it's only above average but I liked it, I'd say the dialogue and delivery are 7/10. The sounds of the guns and bombs are bombastic (haha) to me, really liked the sound of shooting and throwing bombs. Cars sounded good too, don't expect Need For Speed level of sound design, it's good in terms of an open world game, especially one set in the 1940s.

Okay so story, some people might so and say "what story?" And I'd partially agree with them, it's an above average story interweaved with the original Godfather's story. Above average because it takes inspiration from the original films and Goodfellas, not because it's particularly impressive or good. 6/10. The ending scene is hilarious, it hits out of nowhere and makes no sense. I'm talking about beating the story and destroying all family compounds and stuff. The original story is not done justice at ALL, at first it was kinda fun, for the first 2 hours it feels like it KINDA fits but nah it's just messy after that. Feels kind of rushed and uses a lot of cliches but it's serviceable at least, not bad. If you think of it as a Godfather game then yeah it's bad. It's like the Godfather Part 3, where it's not a bad piece of media just that the Godfather movies are masterpieces so IN COMPARISON they seem bad. Part 3 was a 7/10, a good movie but this game is AT BEST a 6/10 in terms of story and only because the original Godfather's story is there, if it weren't there it'd be like a 4 or 5/10. There's just no impact when the original movie's plot points hit, at least for me.

Okay so serviceable visuals, good enough to good sound and mediocre story. Gameplay must be average too right? Well holy guacamole this is where the game truly shines. This is no Sekiro but this is what I always wanted in open world games. To be able to go into shops, stores, warehouses and stuff. It feels, open... alive. Okay so let's start from the bottom. Movement is, fine. Running and walking feels a little janky because the aiming is pretty weird unless locked on, otherwise it's fine. Running actually feels like running though idk what it is but the guy looks like he's running like his life depends on it when he runs and that's important cus you HAVE TO run sometimes. Driving is also fine, sliding is fuckin awesome and makes for some cool moments in game and driving fast is fun in coupe cars but those aren't too common and you'll have to look around a bit. Thankfully this game doesn't have the GTA problem of spawning more of the same car you're driving and continues feeling like the world goes on without you, with the same influx of different cars. Chases range from good to bad to fucking awful. Enemy cars don't follow you at a steady pace, they match your pace or become faster so if you drive the fastest coupe they'll drive at mach 1 and destroy themselves if they hit the wall or something. Chases feel so shit because instead of spawning cars in a good way like from around the corner or something, they just spawn 10 meters behind you randomly. They then drive faster than you at your fastest speed and ram you like bruh what am I to do, especially when the main missions ask of chases sometimes it's horrible. Driving normally is okay though and can be used to cheese locations by clearing out guards. This game having limited health with only health pickups saved it. It's an absolutely fantastic feature. I love it. It created so many tense moments and I've died like 15-20 times. You thank the Lord whenever an enemy randomly drops a health drink or you find one in a warehouse during dire situations. Now time for the juicy bits, the shooting and the rackets. So, shooting is fun, very fun for me. In this game you solo like 40-60 people and that makes you feel like a bad ass especially when everyone seems to have different health bars, some need more shots and some need less depending on rank, they have the same weapons as you just that they can't switch and the weak point thing, oh Lord it's AWESOME. Shooting someone in the knees and crippling them for a few seconds, shooting someone's hands and disarming them THAT's bloody AMAZING. Makes some intense fights easier because you were able to do some quick thinking. Cover system is fine, I barely used it cus you have to peek out to shoot and I'd usually get blasted. I stuck to crouch behind stuff and locking on to someone and then walking sideways from a wall I was hugging. Gunplay is fun with the lock on, you wait for the reticle to get smaller and if you're careless and get shot you are unable to get accurate shots, great balancing act. Shotguns are tough to use but deadly and Tommy guns are a BLAST to use. Just mowing down people randomly is so gangsta and cool. And the fact that after someone dies they stay in that animation as you continue shoot is masterful, it's so awesome like you feel like you're mowing someone down, not kinda shot him a little and he's dead. The snub nose is pretty wack and is decent for the first few hours but you'll use everything except for that. The pistol and magnum were my favs to use most of the time for their usability but the Tommy Gun was perfection in terms of fun. No need to wait for accuracy just go and mow some people down, AWESOME! Magnum hits hard in this game, really liked it. The upgrade system for guns is so cool, it gives you a really good reason to hold onto your money and buy stuff and creates really difficult opportunity cost situations. Should you get this gun or that gun or wait to get the level 3 of another gun? Money and money management is AWESOME. The way you can customise your character's face is quite awesome for me but I didn't change too much but I loved outfitting him up a little and you've got a few cool ones so you can save money for that as well. Then there's the most important one in a way, the safehouses. These places are so vital for running from cops and just to save your game and restock on stuff. Lovely. Feels like you're setting up operations in a different place and buying new hotel rooms and rooms that were rooms to let is so awesome and adds to the immersion.

Hits are pretty damn cool and it can be nice to fight through people and kill someone in a specific way and the stories attached are kinda nice i guess. At least the hit targets feel different. Good idea, not bad. The story missions are quite eh sometimes, kinda good sometimes and shit sometimes. overall a 5.5/10. Anyways, the coolest part, taking over rackets and shops. Yes, it's addictive, you just go to a shop, try to muscle the owners into running the shop under your protection and try to find out their weak spots. I love it. Got all the shops before I finished all the story missions and got all the warehouses and compounds before that as well. Warehouses are brutal and pretty shitty sometimes because this game has a pop in problem. Enemies don't have pre set positions they stay at, they just pop in there sometimes and sometimes pop in behind you. It's especially tough at warehouses where you had to fight through 40 people and someone with a shotgun could come up behind you and finish your hard work in seconds. Taking over compounds surprisingly felt a bit easier for me, you gotta destroy 2 buildings but I guess less pop ins made it less difficult. This game is kinda difficult by itself but the pop ins made it Dark Souls tier to me, janky and tough lol. Bribing cops and G-men was so cool, it was like having to balance your pay check with having enough to fend off opposition family and police so that you don't get fucked. I like a challenge so you bet I had fun trying to play the system and winning fights and bribing officials. a 9/10 in terms of gameplay, if jank and pop ins were fixed it'd have been a 10/10 in terms of gameplay. Oh yeah I forgot, you can box too, there's that. And upgrading your character is very satisfying! I loved having to choose between the different options.

So, a game that basically tarnishes The Godfather's name basically but still isn't bad? Well, that's what good gameplay does. EA should've not released this, they should've released this game under a different name. It would've gotten more favourable reviews and looked upon more favourably because everyone will inevitably compare this to the Godfather which is unfair, this game tries to be something by itself which is evident by the insertion of your character into the plot of the original movie with his own side plots and some arcs. The gameplay and variety of stuff you have is so fun though, buying hotel rooms, safehouses, bribing officials is a realistically corrupt thing that mafiosos would've done, fighting to take over rackets, shops and warehouses is bloody fun and makes you feel like superman. After you rise up ranks in the story people in the street and maybe even your own Corleone members react differently to you. Phone calls are a cool way to get some missions. Blowing up compounds really does feel like destroying a family from its roots. Just an overall bad ass gangster game.

So, this is a must play for fans of the gangster/mafia genre, makes you feel badass and lets you do gangster stuff. Don't think too much about it, play it and have fun kind of game. Just a blast to play. If it didn't tarnish the Godfather name it'd have been a 4.5/5 and if the jank were fixed with a new remake/remaster it'd have been 10/10 for sure but as it is, it's just a very good game with a number of flaws that can be forgiven for a truly unique and sort of immersive city with nice activities. I loved the shit out of GTA San Andreas and its gang wars were one of my most favourite features in a game along with its "RPG" stats, this game brings both and improves/changes stuff up with them so of course I'd love this. I think objectively this game can be classified as a 7/10, a good game, but the subjective experience was fun and considering it's nearly 2 decades old? Job well done devs.

Not a timeless classic but a fun game. I have a soft spot for games that are fun, I care about story but if the gameplay is too fun then it can negate a bad/mediocre story and if the story is too good it can negate the mediocre story. This game's gameplay lifts it up to very good status with its gameplay. Hope you have as much fun as I had with this game, a blast to play. If it weren't for my big backlog and my short attention span, I'd have finished the game further. Had some hits, safes and safehouses left and also didn't buy the level 3 shotgun. I just ignored the film reels in general cus idc about that but yeah, an absolute romp!

An absolute win in terms of design, storytelling, sound design and especially atmosphere. This game is what happens when there is passion in dedication. You see, I used to wonder why even though Marvel movies may be serviceable or some big budget games are kinda fun they're just not amazing, this game opened my eyes to that. They lack pure passion and talent. When something is made with love, you can just feel it, that's exactly what happened with this game, every minute was just oozing with love and care. After looking at the "making of" I can see why. These guys knew what they were doing, even if people have creativity these days and even nice ideas, they lack vision. They lack the ability to set their sights on a target properly and go for it with all that they have, that's what I think at least. Games need not be 80+ hours long, this 8 hour game showed me that quality is ALWAYS better than quantity.

Let's start from the base, the thing that holds everything together and the main attraction, the story and especially the characters. Each character serves a purpose, shows what's happening in the story and the main character here is the perfect example of doing a protagonist correctly, ESPECIALLY for this medium. What's the best part of this game is not just its story but how this story takes advantage of the fact that it is not a movie, a novel nor a comic, it's a video game, an interactive medium and uses that to its full potential. Typically you'd see compromises in stories or characters due to that but nope not here. Absolute class act. I do not want to spoil the story nor the characters so this is where I will stop, I do not think a review should spoil events, but honestly I went into this game knowing half the story and even then I was moved. The writing in this game is no less than Breaking Bad, The Godfather, Se7en, Perfect Blue, Requiem For A Dream, etc. I know it's cliche to say this but for this game it absolutely is true. This game stands shoulder to shoulder with those giants and does so confidently and with pride. That is respectable to say the least.

Moving on, the sounds. Absolute masterclass from the absolute mad lad Akira Yamaoka. Silent Hill 1 was good, great at parts even but overall not amazing in my humble opinion. The end game blooper track was absolute fire though. This time, Akira came back guns blazing. Spooky tracks are spookier, atmospheric tracks are dreamier and the rock songs are such bangers I played this game just because of them! This guy is an all in one band and composer and I have the utmost respect for him. Filling me with dread at one point, sadness in another and then making me bop in the same game is just nothing short of a miracle for me. 20-50% of this game is basically carried by the sounds. That's how important this game's audio is. Picture this, the windows XP background with the "Promises" song from this game, imagine how you feel. Then picture the windows XP background with the "Black Fairy" song. Music and just sounds in general are important for any experience now but for this game it is vital. The story is the soul and the music is the heart that beats and keeps everything running. Thank you Mr Akira, your work will continuously get recognised hopefully.

The visuals are outstanding, "technically" this isn't perfect but does that matter? Absolutely not, this game looks beautiful and all of that is because of their vision, confidence and their commitment to their work. The fog is still beautiful, mirrors REFLECT the whole scene without needing ray tracing or any screen space shenanigans. The textures are good, not great but that actually adds to their charm I'd say for 80% of the assets, makes the game grittier and spookier.

The gameplay is something I like a lot honestly, I think this game is a better version of resident evil though I haven't played those older ones. The claustrophobic controls and environments with the mid accuracy and stuff all add to the experience. The only gripes I have are some mediocre bosses and some long running and walking which are boring and time consuming sometimes. It is spooky for a minute or two but after that you get used to it if it's the same location. When thrust to a new location the fear of the unknown kicks in and then yeah they took advantage of that and did stuff with it. Some unnecessary "jumpscares" and enemy placement was also inconvenient, like I understand it was to scare but I'd say the jumpscares could have been cut by 50% and the impact would've been FAR greater. The (SPOILER ALERT) bathroom one will always haunt me, greatest jumpscare of all time.

So, a game with damn near perfect visual style, aural experience and a mind numbingly good story, what could go wrong? Nothing much really, just minor gripes with the gameplay and some in my opinion, poor decisions, reduced my enjoyment of purely the gameplay to 8/10. HOWEVER, the story was an absolute win, 10/10. FINALLY, the most important part is, my enjoyment of the game as a whole was 10/10, an absolute masterclass in video games and story telling. You know that thing where even if something isn't absolutely perfect it's still amazing? This is it. Nothing can be perfect and this gets so close to it that might as well call it perfect hah. Story was moving and the atmosphere, instead of making me "scared", made me dreadful of what was going to happen. That is far more difficult to pull off, let alone pull off for a whole ass game. Bravo Team Silent.

Now additional notes for the Enhanced Edition, I think using the noise filter is mandatory. Using a 480p resolution is cool and using a crt filter may be cool but isn't my cup of tea. 480p resolution is great! Game looks great imo, CRT filter was great too due to the colors but I hated the dotted look. Finally, the upscaled images can be a miss sometimes! The FMVs too, they're a bit uncanny compared to the pristine and (imo beautiful) original FMVs, but that's just me. Look at a comparison or two online and choose your poison. Lowered resolutions look good and emulate the original art style which is great and I'd have done that myself but 1080p was a good middle ground between TOO SHARP and too aliased.

Remember friends, this is not a "you should play" but a "you must play" type of game. Experience what the best of gaming has to offer.

People praise this game a bit too much, no, this is not a 10/10. The gameplay is friggin horrible, i remember being one of the people who defended the gameplay but after replaying it i have to say it was just a big pain in the ass for me. Insane amount of bugs, had to replay 10 min long parts of missions just because this game decided it'd bug the heck out. The shooting was pretty bad, you never know when the enemy will rush onto you or when they'll just sit like chickens ready to give birth. The dodge roll system is laughable, you try to roll and you get showered with bullets. The driving is so bad that i want to bang my head on the wall, i remember failing so many missions because i just randomly hit a curb that sent me flying or even made me die instantly for no reason even when i was driving at 20 mph (i ride my bicycle at that pace). The shooting from car is broken, you just can't kill the enemies that way, you don't even know if they're getting damaged or not, they don't cry, no blood falls out, you just keep shooting hoping they die once. It takes so many shots to kill someone that you just wonder what the heck is it that they eat/are wearing or if you're using nerf guns. Oh yeah, SO MUCH DRIVING, I DON'T WANT TO DRIVE SO MUCH, IT'S A PAIN IN MY GODDAMN ASS. The driving is not fun and they force you to drive so much, what is this, taxi driver? The voice acting is 5-6/10, it feels sometimes like they're just reading it off the script, i feel like the script is so good that the voice actors just had to read it to make the story feel great. Good lord was the story good, the script could've used some polishing but you can just feel the amount of love the writer had, the feelings he wanted to convey, the story he wanted to tell. The only reason im giving this an 8 and not a 3, the story made me want to finish this god awful game. Trust me, if there's any reason to play this game, it's the story. I still feel like Mafia 2 has a better story but nevertheless, this is still beautiful, some polishing and a stellar cast would've made a terrific film. The gunshots sound pretty powerful so plus points for that, the soundtrack was pretty cool actually but got repetitive. The main theme tho, when it started playing near the ending, ughh i just lost control. Side rant : to the people that say "oh this game is from 2002 what do you expect from the gameplay?" I played Max Payne, Diablo, Age of Empires 1 and 2, Hitman 1 and 2 (the og), Fallout 1 and 2 and most notably, GTA 3, all of them were amazing but gta 3, good lord was it good, i experienced no bugs, had a crazy amount of fun and just could not stop smiling and thinking about this game, so no, i won't go easy on this game because it's from 2002, if it is actually good it will stand the test of time. I wouldn't have minded the graphics if the gameplay was good buuut it wasn't so another thing to complain about, something about it just feels bland, compared to gta 3. IMO hitman 2 looked miles better and GTA 3 as well, let's not talk about the beauty that was Metal Gear Solid 2..... haha so you get the picture, it is old but that doesn't mean games weren't smashing good back then, it's just an excuse for bad game design. They were ambitious but made a **** game with an amazing story, I felt awesome reliving this story but wanted to end myself when playing the game itself, hope whoever reads this doesn't feel the same way about the gameplay as i did and has a blast like others did. If you don't want to play the game at least watch walkthroughs/just check the story out, you'll love it trust me

I tried really hard to make myself like this game but the constant reuse of enemies and bosses is just tiresome. The open world is vast and beautiful, but also rather empty. Playing this game made me understand the beauty of the design of the other souls games. I played the DS trilogy and Sekiro, and after all that I have to say this game is a combination of all of that but reminds me the most of DS2 mostly because of the mediocre bosses and reusing of the bosses for the most part. The game just felt tedious to me, I kinda liked exploring but it was pretty annoying because I had to stay a certain level and levelling up in this game was far harder and tedious than the other games. I love open world games like Fallout and stuff but this one just ain't it, at least for me. I'm someone who likes something refined to perfection, even if it has a small scope, for example Sekiro or Doom Eternal. However Dark Souls 3 is my fav in this series, simply because of the amount of fun I had, the bosses were amazing of course, but the enemies were to fun to fight as well. Less so than Sekiro but still fun nonetheless, everyone just focuses on DS3 but it just strikes an amazing balance for me and is just fun basically.
I like to stick with STR stats and huge weapons, but I tried DEX and the samurai class with some magic weapons in Elden Ring, hated it so I went to try a bit of a greatsword and liked it a lot but the game itself was just frustrating. I played this game for like 50-ish hours, this game is far too long for far too little actual original stuff. My friend finished the game and hearing about the bosses I didn't fight against genuinely makes me have some fear of missing out but I stand by my decision to not play it in the near future. This game drained me and I didn't play any games for a few months until I replayed Doom Eternal and had a blast. Even if I let the reusing of the bosses slide, I just had a worse time playing the game, the fighting animation was smooth and lovely but the gameplay of the game was just meh or even bad to me. That's because the timing of the bosses was just so off to me, it felt pretty delayed. It never felt like a fight that was flowing. The animations after they started were fast but it always felt like the bosses and enemies were winding up for far too long, I felt a disconnect, I was not immersed. Comparing this to the lovely fast paced, no delay fighting I experienced in DS3 just made me wonder if it were possible to get that into Elden Ring, if the combat was like DS3, like even if it were completely the same, I'd have played this game for 150 hours because it'd have been fun. As it stands it is not fun for me. Except for Radahn, I might have been slightly underlevelled or maybe just the right level for him but I had fun with him, was fast enough and the delays felt less bad compared to Margit and Morgott, they were challenging and I felt accomplished after defeating them but it wasn't necessarily fun.

I wish there were a way to improve the combat speed and decrease the redundancies of the game and condense the game to 60-80 hours. Then this game would've been truly GOTY worthy. I'm not one of those people to say that this game is ugly or anything, I just think this game has quite a few bugs and subpar performance for how it looks but the Souls series has always had bugs and this is an open world so ig it makes sense. Feel free to try this game, it's struck a chord with millions and could certainly be the best game ever for you, but it wasn't for me and I've said above why.