Long before I decided to become a game reviewer, I used to jot down brief thoughts on the games I was completing in order to capture my feelings for personal archival purposes. Since then, I’ve of course evolved my craft into full-fledged write-ups, but I do think there is enough merit to some of the earlier critiques to warrant their publication, especially for titles I do not intend on replaying (in the near future at least). I’ve thrown in some updates, but this is one of them.

Graphics
-Beautiful menu interface

-Graphically the game is gorgeous, but I had to turn down my settings to not only to stop it from constantly crashing (though even then it would still occasionally crash) but to stabilize the fps and avoid motion sickness. The Frame Rate takes a particular hit when turning the mouse. Not as bad as in the Portal elevator, but still not good.

-Texturing in particular is extremely well done, even though the worlds are mostly simple.

-Egyptian carvings on walls are impressive at first until you realize they are just repeated ad nauseam.

-Matrix glitches are cool

-Water effects were good

-No character shadows or footprints

-Lots of particle effects but nothing substantial- raindrops hit the ground but don't splash, clouds rarely move, falling leaves phase through the ground.


Story
-Game's philosophy is really good via the terminal entries, Milton Library Assistant (MLA) dialogue, and QR codes that reveal messages from other players, but The Talos Principle’s biggest problem is that the puzzles don't relate to the philosophy. They act more like literal levels serving as a barrier between the philosophical checkpoints. As a result, the game starts to significantly drag towards the end. Though I admire the developers for putting in this content, it honestly could've been made shorter to better serve its story.

-MLA reminded me a lot of the Computer from Courage the Cowardly Dog with his sarcastic attitude. I liked the number of responses the developers put into the interactions with him. The psych profile in particular was a big trip since it nailed my mindset.

-100% ending sucks.


Gameplay
-Like that level signs get crossed-out/X-ed when you complete a level so that you know if you completed it. Unfortunately, the stars are deliberately not made clear, so that can get a little annoying.

-The levels for the most part are very well-made. Aside from a few, I never once felt that there was a difficulty spike- they were all solvable. One thing I would say is I hated the levels that relied on you having to pull secret levers as that didn't require skill and was more of a pain.

-Lack of checkpoints in levels was also annoying. It's obviously fine in the short ones, but in the longer ones it can be anger-inducing.

-Hate that resetting resets the entire world rather than just the specific level, as it hinders your ability to get the stars that require some change from different levels.

-The tetris puzzles got tiresome towards the end (bonus star doors and the elevator doors).

-Hate the lack of quick travel between the three stations, especially during the end part where you have to drag the ax around between them.


Music
-Esc menu music = opera (different from the game)
-Music transitions are naturally done