The Finals is likely the best example of a good live service, free to play game.

This is a game that genuinely offers something new at a time when it feels like all competitive FPS games are trying to converge into the same thing. The weapon/ability variety is fun and interesting, the game modes offer tension that feels missing from other payload/TDM game modes found elsewhere and the destruction in-game is genuinely amazing.

Despite being F2P, The Finals has a distinct level of polish that makes it feel extremely premium, and it's helped by the fact there are (so far) no pay to win microtransactions or predatory sales tactics found in similar F2P games. It has a generous battle pass each season and a cosmetic store, which offers some of the most unique cosmetics I've seen in any game.

The gameplay is smooth, responsive and rewards teamwork. However, luck is a big element too, timing an attack on a cash-out just right can allow you to steal a win from a team who may be objectively better than you. Reshaping the entire map also completely changes how games flow. A sniper is giving you a hard time from the top of a crane? Fire an RPG at the base and remove his advantage from the world.

As of season 3, the only issues that stand out to me are the balancing and the matchmaking.

Balancing is a tough one and I think this is one of those games where it will always be changing as they adjust other things around the weapons. Some weapons are utterly useless (FAMAS, M60, MP5) due to other weapons that fulfil the same role but are better, the same goes for some abilities. The weapon that stands out as the most egregious is the sniper rifle and I believe Embark know this as their newest map seems to be designed with broken sightlines in mind. Snipers completely ruin the flow of the match and have no direct counter apart from another light also using a sniper.

Matchmaking also needs improvement. It was at its worst mid-season 2 but has gotten better. In ranked modes it's not unusual to match with an AFK player, have a teammate who leaves, have teammates who appear to have never played an FPS before while your enemies are a pre-made all running meta weapons and one shotting you with sniper no scopes.

If you're willing to slog out those unfun matches with bad teammates then the good games do make up for it. This game is something very special and if the devs continue to look after it and engage with the community as they have so far then I think it will last a long time and be fondly remembered.

From Soft's magnum opus.

I've played almost every modern FS game and DS3 stands high above all of them in my mind. Objectively, I think Elden Ring offers more but the quality is not as good and Sekiro's quality is better overall but the experience offered by DS3 is unrivalled.

I'm currently replaying this after returning to Elden Ring and it's like wearing an old pair of comfy shoes. The movement somehow feels better to me than ER, the rate of progression and unlocks is vastly more rewarding than any other Souls game. The world is beautiful and everything flows so nicely, starting at Firelink near the base of Lothric Castle and being able to see everywhere you will go, then looking back from those locations, will forever be more rewarding than new markers on a map. Irithyll to me is one of the best areas From ever made.

The enemy variety was at its best here too, so many interesting designs. The bosses are also the best in the series by a country mile. Only Yhorm stands out for being a gimmick boss but every other boss has a great balance of visual interest and genuine challenge. Pontiff Sulyvahn is probably my favourite boss fight in any From Soft game, it flows so well.

The soundtrack here is wonderful, I can pinpoint songs from DS1 that stick with me, but basically none from DS2/Sekiro/ER. DS3 meanwhile never misses, each boss song is such a perfect match, Vordt stands out as a great one, as does the Abyss Watchers.

The lore and characters you interact with are really great too, each one is very well fleshed out and you really get attached to those who come to Firelink Shrine. I love Siegward's journey in this game too.

I've always loved this game but after putting 100+ hours into Elden Ring and coming back to this, there is a night and day difference, DS3 just puts a smile on my face and challenges me in a way ER never did. Everything has a purpose and is designed so intentionally, the consistency of the game from start to end is just phenomenal and all I want to do is keep going back to play more.

The most valid complaint in my opinion is that this game is too easy relative to others in the series. I agree it's probably easier than DS1 however I chalk that up to DS1's rushed development cycle meaning half of that game is reused/underbaked with sudden difficulty spikes and it having far more gimmicky bosses.

As a massive From Soft fan Elden Ring frustrates me.

I appreciate the new things they tried here but I can't understand the insane hype around this game. I was there for it since the very first teaser trailer, I pre-ordered, I played on launch, I have yet to actually finish it over two years later.

The biggest flaw with this game is the fact it's open world. That wonderful, flowing world design of DS1 and DS3 has been swapped for an empty map where you just fast travel from point to point. I think they really struggled to fill this world as there are so many reused enemies, especially reused bosses. No, fighting the tree sentinel again isn't fun. Neither is fighting the Watch Dogs for the fourth time. Nor is running through the same dungeon with the same traps and enemies.

Being open world I expected more variety but by the time I cleared out all of Limgrave I felt bored. Likewise, the bosses on offer here run the entire spectrum from "this is absolutely busted and borderline unfair" to "how is this not just a common enemy". The Valiant Gargoyles to me are the hardest bosses in the game, harder than Radahn or Mohg, because they are poorly designed.

Rennala probably has the most "interesting" boss fight but she isn't particularly difficult or fun, but visually creative. Most other bosses are just forgettable.

I found myself frustrated by how little the game gives you in terms of items. 4 hours of gameplay in DS1/3 would net you several full armour sets and a full page of weapons. 4 hours in Elden Ring nets you a handful of crafting items, some gloves if you're lucky and several of the same plain sword. Exploration feels unrewarding to me here, more like padding.

The best area in the game by a country-mile is Lyndell, it's beautiful, it's maze-like at points, the enemies feel like a fair fit for the location. It reminds me of the better areas of Dark Souls 3, but it's too short and not long after you hit the late-game difficulty spikes of getting ganked DS2 style.

The lore here never grabbed me either, unlike DS3 where I want to know the story of every minor character only mentioned in passing, here I couldn't tell you who is who or what their motivations are, they just never got me interested.

I may sound harsh but it's only because I love these games and this feels like a clear step back. It's still a phenomenal game, probably the most accessible and easiest starting point for a new player to these games, but as a long time fan this isn't for me.

Sidenote: Seamless coop mod makes this game significantly more fun but it does break it in some ways.

HL2 definitely shows its age nowadays but I am always compelled to return every year or two.

It actually doesn't even matter what HL2 is like anymore, its impact on the industry is probably one of the most significant of all major releases, so much so that the engine built for it over 20 years ago still continues to be used to this day.

I have probably spent more time consuming content about Half Life than I ever did playing it.
There isn't much to say here other than if you never played it you really should.

I played about 10 hours solely as F2P, the core gameplay is fun but everything else is absolutely terrible. The UI is a mess, new players are given zero direction (the onboarding is legendarily bad), the story is impossible to follow using only materials available in game, mechanics are not properly explained. I could honestly write a wall of text explaining in detail everything wrong with this game.

If you are playing as F2P you won't get far before hitting a point of disinterest, however I picked up the Legacy Collection for €12 which includes 3 prior campaigns and for that price it's absolutely worth it. I can see how people dump thousands of hours into this game but it takes smashing your head against a wall for a long time until your head breaks through to the other side and you see exactly what's fun about it.

I would only recommend buying the legacy collection when it's got a steep discount and do not buy any DLC for full price, especially for the €100 (wtf) asking price on new DLCs. Be prepared to spend as much time reading guides and watching videos as playing the game to get the most from it. Bungie also have a very well documented history of price gouging, lying to their fans, misleading sales practices, unfair layoffs, etc. Go buy some grey-market keys and feel better about yourself if you really want to play this.

I play this solo 90% and it's fine - LFG isn't great, expect 20mins+ to find a group who isn't half AFK or kicks for silly reasons. Overall the game is too easy imo, not sure if it is scaling related to being solo or not but apart from the odd difficulty spike with a boss you basically won't ever die unless you fall off the map.

Initially I wasn't convinced by Helldivers 2, I saw the immense praise it was getting and figured it would be another flavour of the month game that would fizzle out fast. My first 12 hours or so with the game also didn't convince me, I saw how people were having fun but I found the difficulties to either be overwhelming or far too easy to be fun.

I don't know what happened but at some point it clicked and I now adore this game and the community around it. I think it happened when I went back to fighting to Automatons with a full squad of 4, the chaos is unrivalled. This game is at its absolute best with a full squad at a difficulty that challenges you. Unlocking new weapons does help too as the beginning weapons aren't too great or interesting and even at almost 30 hours I mostly stick to an early unlock shotgun.

The game knows it's a game first and foremost and I think that's why it's so fun, it doesn't pretend to adhere to any realism and will just throw things into the mix for the sake of it and it works. The Devs are constantly balancing and adding new weapons. They have also really made the live service model work as well as it should with the story of the "campaign" evolving weekly with major orders, it is fantastic.

I am also impressed by the community, surprisingly most players are great to play with, so don't be intimidated if you're a solo player. The worst teammates I've had were always just new players on difficulties way too high for them who didn't have a good understanding of strategems.

Absolutely worth every penny and I hope it's a game I end up putting several hundred hours into it.

There's no doubt that BG3 is a good, well-made game, however I personally wouldn't recommend it to anyone who didn't already enjoy D&D/Western RPGs. If you do enjoy them however there is a lot this game can offer you but as someone who isn't into them I really struggled to love this game, and I did try. I feel like at some point in the future I will come back to BG3, blast through it in a week or two and end up loving it without trying but for me right now I find it very frustrating. For context I played about 2/3s solo and 1/3 in a multiplayer party. My review is going to sound pretty harsh I think but I don't hate the game or anything, I just can't say I understand the immense level of praise it's gotten.

The worst element of BG3 in my eyes is the combat, I find nothing fun about it at all, there are classes and subclasses, weapons, enchantments, scrolls, etc. yet despite all that it feels like the combat encounters are all the exact same, the only thing that ever feels noticeably different from encounter to encounter is the number of enemies or enemy health. The spells used, weapons available, even the combat arenas should all be a factor but it never felt like they were. After 20+ hours of gameplay I'm not ashamed to admit I changed to the easier difficulty just so I could stop feeling like the combat was such a slog. I didn't find it particularly difficult, just boring and repetitive. Some fights can last 20+ minutes just because each enemy has to take a turn and you need to wait for each to play out. I don't think there are many people who would agree with me on this point, but I can honestly say I never enjoyed combat in this game.

I think what underpins why I dislike combat so much is the fact that the RPG elements in this game are so good. Combat felt like it got in the way, it would grind the pacing to absolute crawl when I was excited to meet the next quest-relevant NPC and engage in dialogue to try and complete the quest. I found it far more rewarding to utilize character abilities to outsmart people in conversations, or non-combat interactions.

The issues I have with BG3 though go beyond the combat. In almost every session, I would come across something that would frustrate me immensely. I would make my party leader jump from a ledge, take -10hp, expect my party members to follow only for them to stand there doing nothing, so I swap to that character and make them jump and take -10hp, only to watch my party leader jump back up at the exact same time, meaning they have to do it again now and take another -10hp. Yes, my fault for not unlocking the party, but why do party members just not follow in some cases and in other cases they are basically the party leader's shadow?
In my first playthrough I killed a vital character in my camp only for them to still be there and for it to break another character's quest as a result. Sometimes enemies would just pass through walls to attack me. The pathfinding/routing of character movement constantly bugged out. Equipping items/clothing wouldn't work half the time and would result in my opening and closing the inventory several times to try and get it to work. When I first tried the game it ran great but in recent playthroughs my performance has tanked for no obvious reason. This is just a sample of what's annoyed me about BG3 and when something goes wrong every time I try to play it really does spoil the enjoyment.

There's no doubt that Larian put a lot of work into the world and quests, they do account for how players may react in most situations but there are interactions that feel half-baked. For example, you can come across a woman who is secretly a hag, if you know she is a hag in disguise or if you just try to kill her then two other NPCs will just die randomly because I guess they hope most players will watch things playout long enough for the hag to kill them? That was the most egregious and even then it's not that bad, but in a game that tries to cover all the bases it really stands out when it fails.

TL:DR The game is made with a lot of passion, but has plenty of flaws. Combat isn't fun unless you're already into D&D mechanics on some level.

Edit: Updating 27/05/24 to say that I've been having a blast playing through this game solo again - the AI updates are phenomenal and make the game feel more balanced than ever. My wishlist is now mostly improvements for SWAT AI, more varied enemies (can we get some enemies hiding behind cover, or crouced/prone instead of always being fully upright out in the open?) and the ability to change loadout without returning to the station.

The team has done an amazing job with updating some of the levels too - Port Hokan is incredible, really great atmosphere and a well paced level that stands out from the others.

Edit 14/12/23: Wow this 1.0 update is fantastic - the SWAT AI is significantly improved, enemy AI still feels too easy but overall it's in a much better place. The additional guns is great and I'm a big fan of the commander mode, it makes me want to play every mission and gives me a reason to play carefully with the risk of losing teammates. I think VOID seriously did a fantastic job here and while it's not perfect it's a worthy 1.0.


This game will be amazing in another year or two (hopefully). The TL:DR is that the game is worth trying out if it appeals to you at all, but in its current state it's not a complete package. I would recommend it but I'll mostly focus on the things I didn't like in the review as feedback for the devs. I play solo most of the time so that's my perspective here.

RoN has a really good foundation, but some strange design decisions and fundamental issues hold it back for the moment. The aesthetic here mirrors a mash-up of Insurgency: Sandstorm with SWAT4 and it works so well - it's helped by the fact the game is visually beautiful and runs really well despite this; the dev team have gone above and beyond to create immersive levels packed with details. The Nightclub mission is an absolute standout and I am impressed that they had the courage to make levels like it, despite knowing it would rub some people the wrong way, I can honestly say that of the official levels in game right now none of them are bad, however it's a shame that the majority of them only offer 1 or 2 scenarios. Another thing that holds these levels back is their complexity, I am glad they chose to create realistic environments over "game-ified" levels designed to hand-hold you from point to point, however it's difficult to tell which areas are in the bounds of a level or where you should go during your first few runs in a mission. Some levels have multiple buildings separate from one another, which leads me to wasting time exploring the edges of the map (unknowingly) thinking there was more to it, or trying doors that weren't obviously off limits. The solution here might be some more in-world context (bloodstains, signs of an attack, etc), I think the Postal Center and the Car Dealership levels are the worst for this.

The lack of direction in these levels is especially frustrating after you kill all of the enemies in a mission - 9 times out of 10 I opt to just fail the mission once all of the enemies are dead because having to round up all of the civilians/find hidden items/gather evidence is incredibly tedious and you can easily spend more time doubling back over, checking every room for these things than you spent actually engaging enemies. VOID are going to be updating the game to add highlights to these items but I don't think it's going to be enough on its own. I find it strange that the devotion to realism extends to having to collect evidence yet we are instantly told when all of the enemies are dead removing any tension from this portion of the game, it's an odd choice.

Another odd choice is the difficulty. The game feels far too easy - I'm not big into slow-paced tactical shooters, I don't go as slow as I should and clear rooms like a roleplayer and even then I didn't feel like I had to. I would make my AI teammates move to a spot at the start of the level and go in solo just to increase the difficulty for myself. The combat is fun, guns aren't easy to use as the recoil is very strong and the suppression effect from enemies is well-implemented but the lack of enemies makes this game too easy, I never felt overwhelmed, some levels like the 4U Gas Station have such a tiny amount of enemies it feels pointless playing it over the larger missions. The gun balance doesn't seem to matter either, I think the guns and customization is to mostly appeal to roleplayers but in almost every situation a shotgun will do everything you want and more. It's great that the devs included the non-lethal weapon categories but it doesn't feel like they are any different to the regular weapons, if I shoot an enemy with an M1014 they drop dead to the ground, if I shoot them with the beanbag round shotgun they drop to the ground, just not dead - there's no increased risk and therefore no real reason to use them.

Going back to the AI, it's bad - by all accounts it's better than it used to be but work is needed. Enemy AI is very unreactive, they don't dive for cover, or reposition, or utilize equipment, etc. They mostly stand in one spot and maybe they will walk to a nearby wall or walk towards you, that's it. The SWAT AI is far more annoying however. I appreciate having the ability to give them commands but they take so long to execute that I would rather just do it myself. It's frustrating to tell my teammates to stack on a door to breach it, only for an enemy to walk through and shoot me in the head because it took them 20+ seconds to do it. The biggest annoyance with the AI is the blocking, it would remove from the immersion but can we have the option to disable collision with teammates please? I've gotten trapped inside small rooms because 4 SWAT members will pile in behind me and block the doorway, then I have to bumper-car my way out.

It would also be an improvement if we could adjust our loadouts at the start of a level - again I appreciate the immersion of having to walk into the gear-room and select your guns there but if you play a mission and find you don't enjoy the guns you have it's frustrating to have to pause, quit back to the headquarters, walk into the gear-room, open the loadout menu, then walk back to the mission table and load back in.

If at all possible VOID, please consider Workshop integration. The mod scene here is still small but has so much potential and I think if you could extend it to the Workshop instead of another platform it would go a long way in encouraging the community and extending the longevity of the game.

My final complaint is the lack of a story or any real stakes. There are brief mission outlines that provide context but the missions lack any motivation for me beyond just killing the enemies, if there was a proper storyline here to link the missions it would help a lot as right now the game just feels like a collection of levels with nothing behind them. Perhaps if teammates died in a previous mission they could be unavailable for future levels? Or you could pick up data from one mission which could perhaps lead to a HVT being present in another mission encouraging you to use non-lethal tactics to apprehend them, etc. It feels like there is so much potential here yet to be explored.

It's a good game for a while but is let down by two key areas.
I would recommend it on sale but not for any more than €30+.

It's basically RE:7 but bigger, larger map, more antagonists, more weapons, etc. It has most of the same characters though a different setting. The first thing I noticed was how amazing it looks, especially for a game under 50gb when it appears most devs either don't know how to or don't care to try and compress their games.

The opening hours are fun, unnerving and very interesting, it does draw you in, it's the typical formula of "you are trapped in this area, find puzzle pieces, kill enemies, avoid the main antagonist until a scripted boss fight". It's fun though the horror feels toned down compared to RE:7.

There are two reasons I don't recommend this game, first is the story and second are the boss fights.
RE:7's story was silly, it was this very realistically-rendered world contrasted with laughably bad, Goosebump's level writing where bosses would taunt you endlessly throughout a five minute fight while your character never responds, or where your character would watch part of their body get sliced off, quietly mutter "ow" then pay it no attention again. Village is exactly the same but I feel like they must have hired the junior writers from the last game because the dialogue is painfully bad, it honestly is hard to listen to. Ethan isn't relatable or likeable, Mia is annoying at best, all of the antagonists come across like theater kids rather than grounded villains. I'm not one to let story ruin a game but Village is unfortunately a game where you cannot avoid the story, similarly you can't avoid the boss fights.

Boss fights in RE:7 were bad but usually short. Boss fights in RE:8 are bad but incredibly long at normal+ difficulty. I hated every single boss fight, they all either had super obvious gimmicks that may as well have been quick time event style button prompts to win or the bosses were bullet sponges design to run down your suppliers and leave you re-loading your save so you can go buy more and re-try. The final boss fight was by far the worst, without spoiling it some attacks felt like they were impossible to dodge, the room felt too small to maneuver in and the lack of feedback from the boss to show whether or not your damage was effective made it feel like a grind. I died three times because despite stocking up on supplies as much as I could and re-trying I kept running out. Landing every single shot made no difference, the fight just goes on and on all while the boss espouses dialogue that rivals a James Bond villain, telling me she is going to kill me while not actually doing it despite have ample opportunity. At some stage I got sick of it, dropped the difficulty I had stuck to all play through and was happy to finish up in less than 5 minutes on my next attempt.

Another issue it copies from RE:7 is that it turns into an action-horror game by the end - why did they decide on this? Animations are slow, your character controls like a boat, you're hindered by this to increase tension in one on one combat sections and all of a sudden you have an assault rifle, unlimited ammo, a horde of enemies and the same awful controls, it doesn't work.

The most stand-out section of the game is when you're in the basement with the mannequin, I won't spoil it but the body horror and tension are unrivaled in the rest of the game however it ended too soon.

If it's on sale grab it for an interesting 10+ hour run but I would recommend 7 over this any day, even with all of its flaws. It starts strong but leaves you wishing for its end.

This is my long-standing Steam review with edits.

Update 2023:
New infantry update is incredibly bad, makes me not even want to play this game anymore.

Update: 2022
The devs still haven't fixed USB microphone issues. They still haven't fixed the server browser showing 2 EU servers and 100+ Chinese servers. They haven't fixed disconnection problems. Not worth it anymore

In its current state it's one of the best game experiences I've ever had.

It's a game that entirely hinges on the community, the difference between a good match and an awful match is whether or not you have a squad lead who knows what they are doing, whether or not your squad mates fulfil their roles and whether or not the team as a whole is coordinated. It's best to jump in with someone who already has a good handle on how the game works and can teach you. Even after 100 hours I still feel like I barely understand the mechanics and tactics but that's part of the fun. The combat is slow, heavy and difficult which makes actually getting kills feel amazing and like you've managed a substantial feat. Even playing as a support role makes you feel like you're contributing greatly, 0 kills doesn't mean a bad match if you spent it being the backbone of a push to take an enemy site.

The game is buggy, the server browser doesn't work 70% of the time, some maps are really badly optimised but I can overlook all of these. Just be prepared for the absolute comedians who think screaming "cyka blyat" and "allahu ackbar" is the peak of comedy.

This is the game I bought VR for.
It was definitely worth it and it sets a good standard for what fully fledged VR experiences should be. As a huge Half Life fan it also scratches the lore itch in many ways, however it's got a bunch of problems. I highly recommend it but I'm gonna highlight my issues since most reviews don't mention them.

1. The story is thin. The game has long periods of nothing where exposition is just given to you over comms for a few minutes, then never mentioned for a while and then a big event happens out of the blue and it's just another act completed. Everything feels incidental and forgettable, the pacing just isn't great. The final act of the story just has everything neatly converge. The ending is amazing and probably the best way they could have wrapped things up, it's an absolute highlight but everything before it could have been handled better.

2. Valve always have the same problem with HL games, and this one has problem that HL1 and HL2 have. There's levels that are just way too long. In HL1 it was zen, in HL2 it was Route Kanal and in this one it's the early sewer levels. They are just boring and I stopped playing a few times because I was sick of looking at similar interiors. The Northern Star levels also dragged on a bit. I wish there more areas set outside and more areas like the Zoo.

3. Controls aren't the best. I played on a Quest 2, it was fine for the most part however reloading is inconsistent and grenades don't work. I notice reloading issues with the shotgun more than anything, especially with the speedloader, sometimes the shells just don't go in even in the right orientation, it defeats the purpose. As for grenades, I died more times from grenades just dropping at my feet rather going where I want them to than I died from enemies. I don't know what causes this to happen, I practised throwing objects, tried different arcs, tried moving my headset with the throw, tried keeping it still, etc. grenades just dropped to the floor 50% of the time.

4. Weapon upgrades are bad. My biggest regret was getting the sight for the pistol, I hated using it and wish I could have taken it off at some stage, the plain iron sights were far easier to use, it got to a stage where I just learned to hip fire when possible. The shotgun's laser also makes it hard to aim the gun when you don't want to hip fire, granted its rare but it did throw me off at times.

5. Performance isn't the best. I'm running a 1660 Super, 24GB of RAM and a Ryzen 5 1600x. Not the best CPU but definitely suitable for the game and can easily hold its own despite its age. My game suffered stuttering when teleporting or changing weapons. In some areas the frame dips were noticeable. I dropped settings right down and even dropped resolution through Steam VR. It didn't really help. I think the issue is SteamVR itself and a lot of players have noted it doesn't do well with the Quest, with performance gains seen by using third party programs to get around SteamVR. The game was playable for me but going from this to any other VR game where it is smooth is jarring.

6. Puzzles. Yeah opening the storage boxes, or fixing the wiring is cool the first 5 times but by the end of the game I wanted to ignore them all just so I didn't have to do them. I understand setting the pacing and slowing things down but there has to be a better way.

7. No melee combat. Running out of ammo isn't rare, I ran past a few encounters because I had no other options. Gordon Freeman's iconic weapon is a crowbar and yet there's no equivalent here, it feels like a missed opportunity and can lead to frustrating moments.

I've got about 60 hours logged in Red Dead with probably 50ish dedicated to the story and I am still not finished. It's a game of impressive scope and detail and one I would absolutely recommend but it's got a lot of issues, there's a million reviews that will you tell everything good about it but I want to highlight the bad elements people seem to ignore.

First, and most obviously, the beginning chapters are a bore, they create a poor first impression, they drag on, the gameplay is dull and it's not fun interacting with the characters when you know absolutely nothing about them, it serves as a good tutorial but one that makes you want to avoid playing the story when the world finally opens up. It isn't until chapter 3 that I actually started to become invested in the story, before that point I only did missions in the hopes of getting into fun shootouts and robberies.

Secondly, the controls aren't the best. Unlike most other Rockstar games I actually found this played on keyboard better than controller. Your horse controls terribly at times, often circling back on itself, falling over nothing, veering off to the right when you press left, etc. I can only assume it's a quirk of the game trying to adjust your horse on uneven surfaces but it feels like you fight with the animal most of the time. On foot controls are better but I've had situations occur where my guns that were equipped before I got off my horse become unequipped and likewise when I go to interact with an NPC I accidentally shoot them when I meant to say hello. A lot of issues comes from the way Rockstar has tried to make animations blend together, glitches occur when you go from sprinting to a slow so that your character can believably turn a door knob slowly to get inside, or when looting a body Arthur just locks up and freezes for a few seconds because the body is laying over an object. If you try to aim down sights while friendlies are nearby often times you'll lock onto them and you will need to reposition yourself in order to actually fire at enemies.

The next issue is that the game is too easy. Rockstar games are designed to be story-heavy and accessible, which is fine, but I found some missions to be laughably easy. You'll start to notice that your horse will often steer itself with no regard for your input in missions because it is scripted to do so, you'll notice enemies standing 3ft away from you can't hit you or that they will keep running right at you and dropping dead in the same spot as their allies. Half of the missions in this game could be completed without even seeing the game, if you could only see the mini-map you'd be able to beat them as the mini-map just makes everything trivial. An NPC might ask you to look for something but then game will immediately highlight the exact spot it is at, removing any hint of a brief challenge, it's as if the game doesn't want you to ever fail. There's no mission that I ever struggled with and I probably died less than 10 times in missions. I'm not saying the game needs to be punishing but it feels like Rockstar would have been better off making a movie rather than a game when the gameplay is so light.

Additionally the game is held back by its setting. It's detailed and authentic but it can make for a boring game. There's no variety in weapons, pistols and rifles feel almost indistinguishable at times, there's no variety in the law you fight it's the same gunfight over and over and spending half of every mission on horseback listening to exposition gets tiresome very quick. I'm grateful they included the option of the cinematic camera where you can just let your horse ride without any input but that doesn't make for an engaging game, it's a means of getting around an annoying piece of gameplay. There are better ways to deliver exposition, I became grateful for missions that would skip time and have me start at the location of the mission rather than needing to ride from camp. I also found myself ignoring NPC encounters along routes to missions because often they needed me to travel in the opposite direction I was coming from, something that I didn't want to be slowed down by.

Red Dead Online is a huge let down, not that you should expect much when you compare it to GTA:O. It's typical Rockstar fare: Lock anything fun behind a paywall/grind, do nothing about hackers, add updates to Online and nothing to singleplayer. Anything worth doing requires goldbars which cost money or weeks of grinding, the missions aren't rewarding, the graphics are downgraded for the online portion, the story isn't engaging and the world feels far more empty. It's fun to mess around in it with friends for a while but there's better games to waste your time and money in.

Finally, the PC optimisation is poor, I can only imagine how bad it was on launch. Everytime my game starts my resolution is messed up and I need to adjust it twice for it to work. I also have to alt-tab twice on launch to use the menus. The game has a 50% chance of crashing when loading singleplayer for the first time or a 75% chance of crashing when loading the online portion. Worth nothing if Rockstar servers are down you can't play this game, I really wish you didn't need a connection for offline games.

If you can put up with the first 3-6 hours there is a rewarding experience to be found here, the story gets very interesting, the characters more intriguing and the world is a beautiful backdrop for it all. I would highly recommend it but just be aware of what you're in for.

Initially when I reviewed this game I did not recommend it but having put more hours in I feel I have a better understanding of it now and while I would recommend it there are some glaring issues.

Positives
Sekiro is not Dark Souls and you should not expect it to be, the game is not about dodging attacks, tanking damage and watching for openings in an enemy's attack pattern. Instead Sekiro is all about preventing openings from ever occurring, that's the key to the gameplay, get in your enemies face, attack as much as you can, deflect as much as you can and break their posture without ever letting up. It's fun when it works and it's impressive to watch. Pair this with the ability to grapple and you have a very mobile and exciting game with a wonderful setting. It's not as magical as Dark Souls but somehow giant serpents, phantom monkeys in kimonos and lightning wielding samurais don't feel out of place. The world isn't as sprawling or intricate as Lordran but it is much more detailed and feels more lived in.

Negatives
I will start off with the biggest flaw in this game. It is linear as hell, not just in world design or story but in how it expects you to play the game, From Software want you to approach each boss in a pre-defined way. For example, Lady Butterfly caused me a lot of trouble in my first playthrough I spent hours trying to learn her attack patterns, trying to counter her, doing everything I could but still struggling. I eventually caved in and checked a guide which taught me that in order to beat her I just need to spam the dodge-counter-attack over and over, locking her into a loop of posture damage. This wasn't even a cheese, this was the way the game wants you to beat her as it mentions the use of the counter-attack before the fight but I didn't think it wanted me to essentially stun-lock her to win. I beat her in less than 2 minutes once I realised this. Juzuo is an annoying fight because in order to have a chance you have to stealth kill the 7 or 8 enemies surrounding him and this takes time which makes dying feel even more punishing as you have to spend another 10/15 minutes setting the fight up before it even happens and it's such a slog trying to fight him without doing this that it's not worth even trying. There's no room to experiment in these boss fights at all, it's From's way or nothing.

The next problem is how imprecise counters are. This whole game is about precision and accuracy, timing dodges and deflections is an important skill and so you would think timing counters would be the same except it's not. I found the Mikiri counter very difficult to get right in the beginning until I realised you don't need to get it right, as soon as you think you need to use it you just spam the button over and over and it will work, same with the lightning-counter, accuracy is not required at all. This feels very at odds with the rest of the game and it also leads to animations getting janky and weird which looks odd in a game where combat flows so well.

The story of Sekiro is also not that interesting in my opinion. During my first playthrough I restarted the game because I honestly lost track of why I was doing anything or where I was going. Even in my new playthrough I really couldn't care less for anyone's motivations, it just feels like text boxes to skim through before moving onto a new area or unlocking a new upgrade, it's utterly forgettable; especially when compared to Dark Souls where it does its best to obscure any actual story and requires lots of investment in the lore which is far more interesting.

Also having to kill bosses twice feels like padding in a lot of the fights, especially the mini-boss fights. Items don't really have uses either, I never used the ceramic tiles, the various balloons or anything like that, you could play the game without ever picking them up.

Also Sunken Valley is so poorly designed, platforming while being shot by 4 enemies who are dead accurate that you can't counter because you're struggling to use the half-broken ledge grab is not fun or fair. Gun enemies in general are a bad experience.

Verdict
Sekiro is a unique game worth trying whether you like Souls games or not. I would nearly suggest it to people who don't like Souls games more than those that do. I would never ever recommend using a guide for Dark Souls but for Sekiro it almost feels like a necessity, if a boss is giving you too much trouble it is probably because you're not playing the game in a way From intended for you to, so maybe keep that in mind.

This is my long-standing Steam review that goes back to 2016. At one stage I would have said R6:Siege was my favourite game of all time, maybe even the best MP shooter of all time, not any more however.

20/08/23: Everytime I return to this game I get more and more disappointed. It's just a shadow of its former self and it's sad.

23/01/22: I can't believe every time I return to this game it gets worse and worse. The new ops are hilariously out of place even for a game that launched with mini-EMP grenades. The maps have been simplified to the point that you can hardly build strategies anymore. Even if you could the entire playerbase has moved away from gathering intel and pairing equipment, instead it's now entirely a twitch shooter comprised of fast peeks and holding angles. The creativity once found in this game is well and truly dead and it's genuinely sad to see how far it has fallen.

24/12/20: Currently in the worst state it's ever been in. I've tried for months to enjoy this game but I've really fallen out of love with it, the community is absolutely horrible now, I play with mic/chat turned off to avoid all the toxic teammates. Teamkilling and abusing the team-damage system is rampant. I've run into cheaters for the first time in god knows how long. The game isn't fun anymore and it's primarily down to the fact the community is so bad now, unless you're a 5 stack this game is unbareable at any rank.

17/10/20: The community is more toxic than ever and Ubisoft have been streamlining the game with simpler maps more suited to pro-league. The map pool for both casual and ranked is lame now and new ops are hit or miss. Sometimes this game makes me want to jump off a bridge but it's my most played game ever so take that for however you will.

27/11/19: Yeah its still good

9/03/18: The implementation of the toxic ban has been great. The people banned permanently from the beginning have been considered to be in the top 1000 most toxic players according to Epi, so I'm happy to see them go. Toxic players tend to be the worst and most obnoxious to be on a team with and to play against, so I'm glad the community is getting cleaned up a bit. The new operators are pretty cool, and it's nice to see outbreak trying something new, even if it really isn't that well done. Supplies are way too easy to come across in Outbreak, you never really need them, and some of the already limited operators are useless to play as, such as Ying or Ash. The game overall is still more twitch shooter than tactical shooter, especially now that you can interrupt reloads at any point and just keep firing. The buffs and nerfs done have improved the game and I think it's better now than it was before White Noise.

28/12/17 - This game has become quite different to what it used to be, all the mechanics are still there but the most recent update added operators who feel really out of place, Zofia especially has far too many abilities and her guns are just too good. Similarly the matchmaking seems to have gotten worse, solo queuing punishes you because it basically means you're always going to be matched into an ongoing game in casual. Since the newest update I don't think I've joined any new casual lobbies when soloing and it's a pain. Similarly the ranked games are so skewed, with silvers and platinum players often sharing the same game. Most players now, even at the lower levels, have played long enough to learn stuff like run-outs and peeks, which are valid strats but make for very boring and infuriating matches, not the fault of the developers, just one of those things. Furthermore smurfs are more prevalent than ever, and good luck joining a game that doesn't have a premade in it.There's still a game here to enjoy but it's not as good as it used to be. I whole heartedly believe this game was one of the best multiplayer games made but in its current state it's definitely not that. The community has also devolved from being one of the best around to almost being on par with total♥♥♥♥♥♥fests like TF2 and CSGO, definitely not as bad since there isn't a market where money can be made but it's not far off it.

25/08/17 - I still stand by this update, genuinely one of the best multiplayer games ever made. Although the recent announcement that they are putting a greater focus on ESL and actually removing maps for being "unbalanced" is ridiculous. That's fine for ranked but trying to make casual even less casual is an all around bad decision. I really hope they reverse it.


400+ hours later and it's my favourite game. It still has a few problems though, namely connection issues related to uplay but it's been getting better in general.

Edit: This is now my most played game and for good reason. Operation Health is coming too so hopefully most of the real issues with this game will be resolved.

Original review:
This is probably the best multiplayer FPS available right now. It's surprising to say that the devs behind a Ubisoft published game actually seem to care about what they make and what the community thinks because they've been fairly ontop of balancing, issue-fixing and releasing patches and content.

The game is 5v5 in one of three similar game modes where one team defends and one attacks. Each side gets access to a number of 'operators' which are basically the game's versions of classes. Each has a unique ability and particular weapons depending on their CTU. The balancing is great, with each class having direct and indirect counters. Each class has its role and while there are a few that can be ignored they can still prove worthwhile on some maps. All the guns fill a niche and none are there purely for padding, the same can be said for attachments.

Destructability is the primary difference between this and other FPSs. The maps are all CQB and most of the combat happens through a wooden/plaster medium. There are distinctive destructable materials in the walls, floors and ceilings and the key to this game is map knowledge, because you'll know exactly where to punch a hole to get a good sight line or where to blow up for easy entrance into a reinforced room. You can have awful aim, poor crosshair placement and generally just be bad, but if you have map knowledge then you're halfway there to winning. It's a testament to really good level design more than anything.

There are problems though, the netcode being the biggest. I still run into issues of severe peeker's advantage where an enemy can poke out, kill me, and pop back into hiding without me ever seeing them because I've died before the server sends me the information that they're there to begin with. Rubberbanding happens frequently and sometimes searching for a game can take up to five minutes in ranked.

The lack of a singleplayer isn't a bad thing, there are situations to ease you into the game which don't have overdramatic cutscenes, pointless backstory and aren't an extended tutorial. They give you a set loadout and tell you to beat a mission. This lets you get used to the operators, the abilties, the guns and the maps without any unnessecary fluff.

You can play this game solo, although most people don't use microphones or communicate much at all, but it's playable and still fun even in ranked. It's better with friends though since information is the key to winning. I bought the game for €15 as a Starter Edition but considering that it took me only 5 months to acquire nearly half the playtime I have in CSGO which took 4 years, I'd say the game is worth paying €60 for. It also ruined CS for me, by showing me what it's like to play a tactical 5v5 shooter that's actually good. I would say avoid the starter edition and just get the full game when it goes on sale once every three months for only fiver more than the starter edition though.