Grahl1

Perfect little game. It left me wanted more, left me wishing that this developer had another 10 games like this. Few games these days are done right. Darkwood could have fallen into banality if it was just another pretty game with a decent story and well-made atmosphere but without a challenge element that actually makes a game feel like a game. Fortunately, it has a very simple, but very effective combat system, and the survival elements add up to the challenge. One of the best games I've ever played, and probably the best indie.

Tyranny excels in all areas, except in actually presenting any challenge to the player. Pretty much the standard these days. A great movie, a mediocre game. It's what sells, I guess.

Another game that suffers from Indie Syndrome: huge potential and huge bad design decisions (I'm not saying all indies are like this, but a lot). The atmosphere, the lore and the graphics are amazing. But everything else feels rushed and uninspired. The combat is little better than Lords of the Fallen. Clunky, clunky, clunky, repetitive, enemies are damage sponges, repetitive enemies. The boss fights are specially disappointing. The worst of all is the lack of checkpoints. Every Souls-like I've ever played (and I've played a lot of them) has many checkpoints, to compensate for the difficulty. This is a difficult game with little checkpoints, not to mention the areas are absolute mazes, and like every Souls-like, there's no map. And finally, the lack of everything. The lack of enemy variety, the lack of bosses, the lack of weapons, maybe even shells. I mean, if you're gonna create a template for a game, then that's most of the work, I assume? Why create little content over that template? Again, a really bad decision. They could have asked double the price with not nearly double the work. 4 main bosses (and not even 4 mini bosses) for a souls-like, a game of bosses, feels extremely lacking. I'm still giving this a 6.5, because the potential is there and one must value it. But it's extremely frustrating that you can see that the developers certainly had the ability to make a great souls-like like Nioh or Jedi: Fallen Order, yet their never-ending stream of bad decisions makes it an average game. Again, the Indie Syndrome.

First I played Planescape:Torment, and I thought it was the best RPG ever. Then I played Baldur's Gate 2, and I thought it was the best RPG ever. Then I tried both Divinity's (Original Sin 1 and 2) and neither really **** me in. Tons of people to talk to, didn't know where to start... So I tried Pathfinder Kingmaker Instead, and again, I thought it was the Baldur's Gate 2 beater I so long looked for. Until I finally tried getting into Divinity Original Sin, I chose the 2, and again, I think it is the best RPG ever. The game is perfect in every single regard, but the most important part to me is the difficulty and the depth of the combat system. After having tried Tyranny, and having gotten ultra-bored even playing in the highest difficulty, I really felt saved with DOS2, by far the most unforgiving game I've ever played (and that's a major compliment, since it's not sadistic level like Super Meat Boy or Cuphead). So many games these days have amazing stories and ambiences, but such simplistic gameplay. I call it one thing: LAZINESS. Because it requires way more heart and talent and genius to develop a deep/complex gameplay, than to create pretty graphics and stories. (Not to mention it's not commercially feasable, giving these Gaming times dominated by filthy casuals). Props Larian (and Owlcat games) for truly saving RPGs. 11/10

If McDonalds was a game, this would be it. Everybody likes it, and i can't find any reason to say it's bad. Just can't find any reason to say it's good either. Hand-holding dominates no matter the difficulty setting, and there's no charm, no spark in anything, it seems like the developers were always thinking of the lowest common denominator. A charmless game, like many other AAA titles of today. No atmosphere, no magic, no mystique. I bought on sale for 10 euros after 4 years of its release, and even then I feel like I've wasted my money.

Jedi: Fallen Order has amazing combat - unlike most AAA action games these days, where you just have to smash buttons and the only way to make it challenging is setting the difficulty to the max so that you die in 1 hit (examples: The Witcher 3, Nier Automata, Devil May Cry series). Most games these days are amazing interactive novels, but not amazing games. Dark Souls changed the paradigm in that regard by making all aspects of the game equally brilliant. And Jedi Fallen Order clearly follows, borrowing even more things like bonfires and elevator shortcuts - and it's completely ok to follow a paradigm as long as you do it with originality.

What makes a game good? it's, ultimately, the combat, or the challenge in some other form (adventure games for instance). A game can have an awesome story, or graphics, or sound, but if the combat is not dopamine-releasing (aka challenging), it's never gonna be as gripping. Unlike many games these days, Darkmaus has an excellent combat - and the rest is pretty good too. An extremely underrated game.

An enjoyable 2 hour experience. A lot of love went into this game. It definitely had the potential to fullfil its main ambition (to break the 4th wall) but it doesn't do it. Worth buying, but it's not a 10. 6.5/10

What can I say... From Software did it again. Distancing themselves miles away from all other devs, creating another masterpiece that is absolutely unparalleled in everything, be it graphics, story, immersion, and specially (man, specially) that gameplay. No games ever made are as challenging and as rewarding to PLAY (not just watch). I mean, the combat is just perfect. Even more complex and rewardng than in the other souls games. And there's no artificial difficulty - this is not freaking Nioh, where everything one shots you. There are no one-shots, yet the skill cap is nearly limitless, unlike Souls games where after a while you realize you just gotta dodge and attack once, dodge and attack once. In short, absolute masterpiece, would call it the best game ever if it wasn't for me preferring Western medieval settings (maybe it's in my blood).

Nioh is indeed amazing. As a Souls veteran, at first I was getting frustrated because the difficulty is about 3 to 4 times higher than Souls games. Lots of one-shot attacks. But you can definitely manage, and even if the average player won't be able to breeze through most bosses after a couple of playthroughs like in Souls, you get used to it. However, going into NG+ I became deeply frustrated with the difficulty and just stopped playing. And this coming from the most hardcore Souls fan you'll ever find. Souls is difficult but fair, Nioh is borderline masochistic. And I still have nightmares of being one-shot (just kidding).

What could have been a great game ends up being quite a banal experience due to a lack of balance in difficulty. I found the game simply unplayble in anything above Normal (you get one-shot by everything, and how are you supposed not to take damage in such an ultra fast-paced combat style), while the combat in Normal and Easy is just not challeging, just hack away and press that heal button that will give you acess to a limit 300 very cheap, very easy to acquire potions. I just feel like this is a game made specifically for 13 year olds. From the "shallow-philosophical" story of 2 emo robots, from the fact that you see 2B's panties all the time, to the boring hack and slash and loot. It all made for a very bland experience, in a world and environment and concept with the potential for much more. Really, I can't get it how this is only getting 9s and 10s. Seems like people no longer play a game to have a challenge, to actually have some dopamine going in their brains, no, they just want an overpriced interactive Hollywood movie.

I had just written a very positive review, but after finishing the game I'm inclined to change it quite drastically. Despite having loved the combat and the immersiveness of the game (above all, both extremely innovative and rewarding), the graphics, the story, I just feel like this game had a huge potential but some major wrong decisions have turned it into something deeply flawed. 1) the most obvious one being the bugs. You immediately start to mistrust a developer when they release a game full of bugs. luckily, I started playing in Sept 2018 so it was barely a problem anymore with the patches, but for earlier players it might have been quite tiresome 2) the ending!! what a cliffhanger! probably the greatest I've ever came across in gaming. Totally disappointing, and looking at the DLC roadmap it doesn't look like they're actually gonna release the rest of the main story 3) when you make a game with an excellent combat system, when you must have put so much effort into it, and then only a small fraction is combat and again, no "combat mode", no pvp arena, no DLC in sight that will give you a reliable dose of combat. 4) I was about the buy the first DLC (From the Ashes), but then it was all people on Steam complaining that the spent 10 dollars for just an extra mission. Again, more mistrust in these developers. Bottom line: if you wanna make a game that costs as much as the top-tier games, it's gotta be top tier. i don't care if your studio is independent or not. And Kingdom Come, despite having huge potential, has some truly unforgivable flaws, half seeming to come from plain bad decisions, the other half from rushing things, greed and lazyness. I can see no replay value, there is no PVP or a "combat mode" to keep playing, and the DLCs seem to be robbery and failling to fill the current gaps. What a waste of potential, can't say this enough.