I have played maybe 200 hours worth of this across 3 platforms, even played it ahead of release back in 2014 and still hate every area, every enemy, every boss, just everything. how unpleasant

unpatched, pre-release amana's is easily one if the most awful zones I've endured through in a video game, no man's wharf is awful, iron keep is awful, sotfs heides tower is awful, almost every zone is ugly, unfinished, filled with enemies with insane tracking and ambushes with bosses that are either bullshit or super disappointing

but i keep coming back to it

Great game, arguably the best in the mainline DiRT along with it's direct sequel
Under the bloom filled environments and the dudebro skater presentation there's a perfect blend of arcade and some realistic bits that feels like glory. The soundtrack is great (but wish there was an option to play the songs during the races), the graphics were great for the time, the presentation is still quite flashy, the locations are well detailed and as a whole it's very pleasant to play
I'd only really complain about the lack of more tracks and the small vehicle roster. Barely any cars older than 2000 and there are only one or two routes per location. After a few replays said content runs dry and left me wanting more. Luckily however, Dirt 3 delivers.

when all your vn has going for it is "queer"

couldn't get into this, the writing is below amateurish yet dense, self indulgent and lifeless. the art is ugly yet very scarce. what's worse is the setting justifies it having the blandest ambient soundtrack known by man

feels aimed towards confused teenagers who only read smut webcomics on tumblr and haven't picked a romance novel in their lives while still pretending to be above what it really is. the vn at its core is fanfiction tier and sadly the presentation is nowhere near good enough to give it a pass out of the audiovisual experience alone

Remake filled with small changes that kill many things that made the original feel special. Graphics look really nice and the game performs well but gone are the original color palette and some iconic visual effects of the original. New character models are more realistic but less expressive. The default control scheme is changed into a more modern one yet the physics and camera are way clunkier than the original. Voice and audio work is far inferior as well, particularly Dormin's echoing voice lacking any sort of mysticism. The saving system being changed into the current day auto save standard in AAA games just absolutely obliterates any sense of place and adventure that the shrines provided.
No additions that would have made it an objective improvement (including cut colossi for example or extra content) were added and we got time-wasting collectibles, a photo mode and filters instead.
Hope this remake isn't the way SOTC will be remembered, and it makes me think twice about taking the convenient route and playing the demon's souls remake instead of the original

it's very much the definition of background game to pass the time while listening to a podcast or something. retarded story and characters with rather uninteresting missions but a somewhat fun core gameplay

that said it's filled with weird design choices that seem to contradict each other. it's a parkour/climbing game but after like 15 seconds of running your stamina runs out, then the entire platforming aspect of it gets thrown out of the window once the hook gun gets in the picture. it's also a melee focused game but you die in a few hits while the enemies are tanks that take forever to die, then you unlock the stomp instakill skill and suddenly melee weapons are pointless. game puts you in situations where you're supposed to think fast but then you have to enter to the pause menu to craft medkits (with a timeout screen at that) in the middle of a fight
many people complain about the final scene being a qte but i find it better than yet another garbage tier boss fight like the big zombie and the machete guy ones