I've never played a Spiderweb game before, so it benefits from experiencing for the first time many of the things I assume make up the Jeff Vogel formula. It has impeccable writing, an astonishing sense of place and ambience, and a very rewarding gameplay loop. And it does all that with no music, very simple sound effects, and very few unique pieces of textures and art. It does fall apart in the last third of the game, though. There are a few areas that don't bring anything new in terms of story or quest design, or that they're just plain annoying (environment attacking you, constant creatures spawning, etc.). All in all, I think it's worth experiencing until the end because of the multiple possibilities the game offers.

Finished the main game + Descent + Trespasser in early 2020, but recently I've been coming back to the game to finish open world stuff I had left, so I decided to also start the DLC and it was a great choice! Hakkon brings a totally new region, with its own lore, main story and conflict. In a lot of ways, it's like any other region of the main game but better. It uses many of the open world systems and type of quests you can find in other zones but they feel more natural and necessary, and the narrative keeps things varied and interesting.

Played the remastered version - which definitely improves textures and the lighting (the fire looks amazing!), but has weirdly inconsistent color grading, some stuttering and all-over-the-place audio mixing.

About the game itself: adored Connor as a main character. Nuanced stoicism yet emotionally potent. Extremely hot, too! It was interesting coming in blindly and wondering what was the game doing for the first few hours, and I admit once you play as Connor, the build-up is quite slow, but overall I like what they did character-wise. Also love the environments (snow!!) and the score (very cinematic, in the best possible way -- reminded me of Batman, for some reason).

Biggest flaw: the mission design. Tired, frustrating and mostly not very interesting. It basically has the same problems as ACII/ACB/ACR but with less imagination and a longer campaign. The open world systems are not very fun either. Crafting sucks, most of the liberation/contracts/assassination stuff is pointless and I didn't bother hunting.

I'd strongly recommend finding every single trinket so you can do the Captain Kidd missions. Very set-piecey but extremely fun! Also, do Homestead missions in between the main story. The character development and little stories are wholesome and show a different side to Connor. You'll end up thinking how can anyone NOT love him?

I think I might give the DLC (Tyranny of King Washington) a shot.

Trying not to be harsher than I should because visually I'm sure it felt revolutionary at the time and there's a good number of impressive set pieces with excellent presentation (in fact, besides the faces, almost everything holds up really well), but I didn't really enjoy it. The two aspects I adored in Control, I nearly hated here. Combat peaked 2 or 3 hours in so they decided to throw more and more enemies at you. When it's to support a set piece or build momentum, it works, but most of the time it just exists to add filler. The story was equally disappointing. It heavily meanders and is not well paced at all. Characters are either dumb, annoying or just extremely flat. Alan has a good voice but only one voice so it becomes boring fast. Almost every dialogue is bad exposition, pop culture references that date the game and just expose how empty and unoriginal this world is, or just annoying banter with clichéd characters.

Played this in preparation for Control's AWE expansion (and, allegedly, upcoming Alan Wake 2), but I also expected to find a diamond in the rough, a cult classic or at least a solid 7/10 game. What I found was none of these things, but a very middling game with counted moments of ambition.

Control at its best. Compelling mysteries, an awesome action set piece, cool new location, and two new traversal/combat abilities. Way better than AWE, and a proper epilogue to the game. This rules!

As a caveat, I'll say that I've played both DLCs more than half a year after finishing the main game, and I lost some of the combat flow and mechanic muscle it required, so I switched on 'immortality' and never looked back. You still take damage, and if you're like me, you'll still feel like you're about to die, but you don't, so you never loose progress. Completely enjoyed both pieces of DLC thanks to this, so I recommend doing so if you are in a similar position.

Really enjoyable RPG. It sits uncomfortably between the older BioWare cRPG and the more modern, console-first ones (think Mass Effect), but it's definitely leaning more towards the second in gameplay and presentation. Small but quite dense levels that manage to evoque a huge world thanks to clever writing and a unique atmosphere. RPG gameplay is heavily stripped down, leaving only the essentials, but that means everything you encounter is hand-crafted, useful and thoughtful. Try doing every quest, enjoy your companions' company and don't spoil yourself.

Technically, it's a marvel. The jump in detail, character and face animations and lighting is remarkable, while other strong aspects of the series in the past (voice acting, sense of place) remain very compelling. Having said that, I'd be lying if I said it hit me as hard the original game and Before the Storm (which I actually prefer). It doesn't pack the same emotional punch, even though Alex is a completely "fine" character with an interesting story and personality. It's quite hard to nail exactly what makes it less special, but yeah, it is. It looks and plays better, but it left me feeling less. Still, if you love story-driven games, it's a must play.