keydemographics
2010
Any given Rockstar game is only as good as the movie it's stealing from, and video games can do a lot worse than stealing from The Wild Bunch. Of course a team of Scottish coke-addicts would be Peckinpah fans.
Still has that Rockstar tone that grates more often than it gets a laugh, but when this game cooks with the drama, it genuinely delivers. If you stripped half the first act and kept the "I Know You" quest, you'd yourself have a perfect western.
Still has that Rockstar tone that grates more often than it gets a laugh, but when this game cooks with the drama, it genuinely delivers. If you stripped half the first act and kept the "I Know You" quest, you'd yourself have a perfect western.
So cool. Has an enthusiasm for the devil that rivals the best of Romero, and this renovation Vicarious Visions died for looks tasteful and stylish. That said, I'm a wet-brained idiot who likes it when the monsters explode so the Diablo for mouth-breathers (3) will always be the one for me.
2012
Takes all the best lessons from DiRT, Burnout, and console sim racing in general to create the complete package. Vibes for days. Every hour is golden hour. Generous without being pandering or desperate, and understands that a great racing game has nice cars and nice places to drive them.
2023
Neither flavoursome nor pretty, and it moves like software. Still the best a sim racer can feel on a gamepad, and the laser focus on track racing is a choice I didn't expect, but I appreciate it. Should have gone harder on being a racing game for track nerds rather than The One On The Xbox.
2023
Electrifying. I was constantly astonished with how many smart decisions the game made in adapting Aliens, and how demanding the real-squad piloting can be.
It's a game that is deliberately, proudly punishing and yet I was happy to roll with its punches because they all made for a good story. I don't regret leaving Latimer behind, the squad would have never made it out alive otherwise!
It's a game that is deliberately, proudly punishing and yet I was happy to roll with its punches because they all made for a good story. I don't regret leaving Latimer behind, the squad would have never made it out alive otherwise!
I dislike it. Dying Light 2 has all of the ambition and none of the execution required to pull it off. Even after 2 years of retooling to make the game systems more like the original, the quest design and map are still dull and needlessly complex. I am also begging the writers to read a book, any book!
Enjoyers of the original Dying Light should be wary of claims that this benighted product has been "fixed" by Techland's dedication to the sunk-cost fallacy. Lipstick has been liberally applied to this pig and no amount of flowery sophistry from Aiden Caldwell should convince you otherwise. We should have all been more bullish on Dead Island 2.
Enjoyers of the original Dying Light should be wary of claims that this benighted product has been "fixed" by Techland's dedication to the sunk-cost fallacy. Lipstick has been liberally applied to this pig and no amount of flowery sophistry from Aiden Caldwell should convince you otherwise. We should have all been more bullish on Dead Island 2.
2014
A nervous game from people deathly afraid of making Far Cry 3 again. The setting, the presentation, the progression; all as good as they've been, or ever will be for the series. Probably the last time this particular formula was fun.
2020
Of course I'm the lone dissenting opinion on what is quite clearly a huge achievement in adaptation, and one of the most consistently detailed games I've played.
It doesn't light my fire. Lots of individual elements, scenarios, and options that I like and will continue to poke at but precious little that I actually love. Larian are geniuses of mechanics and systems design, and the flexibility of the narrative is the clear standout here.
I just... don't think these stories or characters are very good. I don't care about these people. The scenarios they set up are interesting but I've yet to be motivated by much beyond curiousity, some of it idle.
It doesn't light my fire. Lots of individual elements, scenarios, and options that I like and will continue to poke at but precious little that I actually love. Larian are geniuses of mechanics and systems design, and the flexibility of the narrative is the clear standout here.
I just... don't think these stories or characters are very good. I don't care about these people. The scenarios they set up are interesting but I've yet to be motivated by much beyond curiousity, some of it idle.
A decent time and the Yakuza format is still good fun. Kiryu continues to be a bottomless well of deeper feeling, but the game around him is assembled from the trim and offcuts of better Yakuzas. While I prefer the brawler games of yesteryear, the role-playing branch of the RGG tree is bearing more interesting fruit right now.
Played with an eyebrow raised. A game brimming with ideas but none of them are as exciting as Fallen Order feeling a bit like a game made in 2006. Introduces new systems, mechanics, and characters like it's afraid you'll get bored, and I was. We're not allowed to have normal action games anymore, but if this had been half as long and shed the Souls influence, it'd have real potential.
2014
Good! Never played it in its original form, but at least this renovation is more tasteful than CE's Anniversary Edition. I adore it's ambition, and how much it's a product of the Bush era. It's still incomplete and wildly inconsistent but what Halo game (Halo 3 not you) isn't?
2010
Occupies the odd position of being one of the best Halo games while also being the least Halo game. It's great military sci-fi! But that does mean everything is a little too precise and lethal for me. Halo is goofy and Reach desperately wants to be taken seriously.
2009
The worst one. If you strip out the awful Whedon-esque script and cast (Firefly bad show) there are some great sequences and ideas here, but an equal number are tedious and annoying. You can only coast so far on vibes.
2007
Undeniable.
2023
The craft on display is almost inversely proportional to my interest in the work itself. It's not as melodramatic as the game it's taking visual cues from, and it's not clever or subversive enough to compare favourably to other puzzle games or it's own pedigree. An exercise in Good Design, but that's just not my scene.