Icivindur

Gamers with a good memory and wide experience might remember 'Septerra Core', the so-called 'JRPG' made by US based Valkyrie Studios. That brilliant game featured anime-like characters and complex and original turn-based combat system that combined physical attacks with magical “cards” with various combinations. In many aspects 'Edge of Eternity' is a spiritual successor of 'Septerra Core'. The same 'anime aesthetics' made by Western developer, the same involving story, simultaneously dark and light, the same interesting characters and involving turn-based system, though not such as complex and original. Considering that 'Septerra Core' is in top-five games of all times in my list it was not a chance that I could resist to 'Edge of Eternity' charm. Among the positive sides of the 'Edge of Eternity' I'd mention involving story – for our days it is a rare exemplar of a story-driven RPG featuring complex characters with very different motivations and addictive turn-based combat system. The latter includes characters movements, physical and magical attacks, as well as opponents strengths and weaknesses against some attacks. The dialogues might not be on the high literature level, but they are ok - sometimes silly, but most of the time relevant and meaningful (at least in the main story). World’s art design is wonderful, reminding of a fairy-tale (though sometimes it is very dark, like a horror). The world is weirdly beautiful and the lighting system is very good, making the world shine in its best. The main characters’ art design is mostly good – at least female characters are beautiful and quite different. Selene's 3d model is without a doubt my favorite – her breasts animation is mesmerizing. At the same time while attractive, Selene's model is not at all vulgar like it often happens in Japanese or Western games - the art designer achieved right balance here. The voice acting is decent and the music (piano) is matched with good taste. The world is big enough and gives the gamer freedom to roam around without engaging into combats if he don’t want to or to fight every enemy on the map. There are puzzles with decent rewards and there is crafting system allowing you to made weapons, armor, potions, etc. While you’d need at least 20+ hours to complete the main story, thorough gameplay (completing side quests, riddles and various activities) would take about 60 hours and you could easily spend more than 100 hours in the game collecting different materials and crafting. Did I mention Selene's breasts animation already? Anyway this positive aspect of the game deserves to be mentioned twice. The shortcomings are following: Though game has a third person view your character is unable to jump which could be quite annoying in some places. Camera control in combats is a bit clunky and lucks of intuitive WSADQE control. Dialogues while ok are mostly mediocre and you would probably want to skip them. Another minus is that the world, while beautiful, is not at all interactive - it's rather some kind of decorations. There are neither player controlled choices or dialogues between character and nor loyalty system in the game. Relationships between Daryon and Selene are quite weird for my taste, rather reminding not brother and sister relations but relationships between lovers. Myrna’s and Fallon’s 3d models are not as ‘well-turned’ as Selene’s model an a bit vulgar. Daryon’s (main hero) art and 3d model is in no way reminds a soldier. Rather he looks like some anime version of K-Pop 'idol' – slim, short, effeminate and dystrophic soy boy. His character is also repulsive – hysterical, unreasonably stubborn and dumb. Fallon’s character is simply unreliable – she is some poorly written tsundere. The ending of the game is pretty weak and involves some ridiculous melodramatic scenes which are in no way could invoke sympathy in the gamer since he simply won’t be able to develop emotional connection with the characters whose “ill fate” these scenes depict. The political agenda with all that left-liberal “diversity” propaganda is also spoiling the game but surprisingly it is quite tolerable here. "Midgar Studio" is a small French developer and it was quite surprising for me to discover their gem ****. I've bought it on a very early access stage in 2019 and almost two years since purchase I can say it was totally worth the money that I've paid. Overall 'Edge of Eternity' is a decent game for those who love turn-based combat, attractive aesthetics in anime style, involving story and are tired of typical and soulless games which are mass-produced now by 'effective managers'. 8 out of 10 (outstanding game).

A solid story driven action-RPG, diluted with interesting puzzles, Chinese history and mythology. The game has good music and a decent combat system. Completion of the game (for those who care about such things) will take 20+ hours. Among the shortcomings - the world is not interactive and rather "corridor", there is no expanded dialogue system. But there is a romantic line, elaborate characters with their "demons" and reflections on good and evil. A game for those who appreciate good plot, classic approach to storytelling as well as history and mythology. In some ways, the game resembles Jade Empire, but in the West such high-quality story-driven RPGs have not been made for a long time. So those with nostalgia for the classic RPG from Bioware in their prime, but with modern graphics, will love the Xian Yuan Sword.

Horizon Zero Down on the PC infuriates from the very beginning - first, forced sluggish "automatic tuning", which for a top-end PC gives average settings with FHD instead of 4K and does not detect HDR. Apparently Sony considers that PC users wouldn't cope with graphics tuning, probably confusing us with console users. All this automatically tuned crap is of course useless and should be altered immediately, but before that you need to go through, firstly, the aforementioned worthless auto-tuning and, secondly, the forced movie scene that cannot be skipped with its debilitating dialogues and ridiculous world. I remember that this game did not hook me on PS4 Pro, but on PC, after two years, Horizon causes a real hate. In addition to bad optimization, an idiotic soap movie, we have a storytelling with rabid feminism, a boring and silly world with "dinosaur robots" and a monotonous gameplay designed for the most unassuming gamers. In addition, the protagonist is a "strong independent" woman, an intrusive ideological trope which is thoroughly **** up in modern games. In general, the game is not even worth pirating, because it takes up an unreasonably large space on your hard drive. 4 out of 10 (for bad optimization, soap movie scenes, a bummed world, a dumb plot, and a radical feminist agenda).

In times of rapid decline of video games finding such a gem as Breath of the Wild is somewhat marvelous. That said as an earnest story-driven games fan who values witty dialogues, complex characters and deep, involving and original narrative, who is often get bored by the so-called "open world games" I was least probable target audience for an open-world adventure game. If you'd ask me I'd say that it's very unlikely for a fan of Fallout 2, Septerra Core, Planescape: Torment, KotOR II, Metro games and The Witcher 3, who is bored by Skyrim and RDR2 to like BotW. Yet here I am, totally fascinated by it. So what's so special about BotW? First thing you'd pay attention to is the visual design. This game in no way will overwhelm you with graphics excellence but nevertheless it has very distinguish and beautiful visual style which is almost ageless (it somewhat reminds the Prince of Persia 2008). Although beauty can attract your attention, alone it cannot make you stay. Music in the game is unobtrusive and memorable, perfectly fit to the game world which feels live and engaging. Link, without proper clothing, equipment or potions can freeze in the mountains or overheat in the desert, or even burn near volcano. Weapons can be broken (easily) and wile you are free to climb almost everywhere, you have limited stamina and will fall down during the rain. All of these add to the overall atmosphere and involve into this fictional world. But something that really shines in the BotW is His Majesty Gameplay. This game literally adapts to the player - any player! - proposing to use almost all kinds of gaming styles and activities you can imagine. If you are hardcore player who prone to swiftness, tough battles and speedrun, you can easily find tough monsters to fight, go harass Lionels or head straight to the final boss. If you prefer unhurried exploration of an unknown big world (with very different and filled with secrets locations - from snowy mountings to sandy deserts, from tropical islands to frozen tundra), finding its secrets and diverse in-game interaction - you'll find it here. If you, like me, prefer variate meditative gameplay with explorations, fights, solving riddles, following the story, interacting with characters and using gameplay mechanics to differently approach the same situation - you would also enjoy playing BotW. This game allows you to experiment almost freely, it wouldn't restrict or punish any approach to play it. The gameplay mechanics, so-called "physics" is truly marvelous here. Thing is - BotW sets some general rules of its world, very similar to real world physics laws, and within these boundaries allows you to achieve goals in whichever way you are pleased. You can fight monsters relying on your reaction and swiftness, you can drop rock on them, you can set them on fire or explode them, during a storm you can drop metallic object so the lightning will struck them, you can freeze them, avoid them or you can use stealth and steal their weapons, you can flee from them or even set wild bees on them. The same thing with riddles. I can't say that I'm very much into riddle games but shrines were my favorite part of the BotW. There are different ways to solve shrine riddles. Some of them probably weren't intended by Nintendo developers, Just think how use set of general rules of this world and you'll quickly find solution fit for your gaming style. Moreover those riddles (dungeons) are short enough to not become boring. If you like stories, you can explore Link's past, reading diaries and recollecting Link's memories about his relationship with princess Zelda and Champions. Personally I preferred to collect memories and complete shrines in an unhurried manner, but other gamers' experience can be completely different. That's the secret - BotW is open for any type of player with any gameplay preferences. Experienced, demanding gamer such as myself is as much welcomed by the BotW as hardcore player or complete novice. You can cook here, you can upgrade armor, solve riddles, complete quests, find koroks, fight, explore, experiment. But all of those activities don't feel like separated, don't fell apart - they are expertly woven into the game world, creating complex and involving atmosphere. This game is like symphonic music, combining different instruments, harmonies and melodies into the one beautiful symphony.

I'm not a fan of the first game (it's to boring and overly melodramatic as for my taste) so I didn't really cared about some elements of the story that upset other gamers (you know, Star Wars-like butchery of beloved characters). But what I care about is storytelling, characters and gameplay. And TLOU2 managed to fail in all of those categories. All good games, despite all differences, have common traits - they gave freedom of choice to the gamer and respect that choice. TLOU2 does exact opposite to this. Gamer is literally forced to play for characters he doesn't like, to follow the story which is not involving, to made choices he doesn't want, to share opinion which he doesn't share and so on. Moreover gamer is not even allowed by the developers to express dissatisfaction with this forced agenda. All opinions which are not complimentary to this game are blamed and humiliated without consideration. Meanwhile mass-media hype and ratings are ridiculous. Seriously - calling TLOU2 right after it came out not even the "best game of the year" but "best game ever" stinks. Even when The Witcher 3 came out in May 2015 very few dare to call it "game of the year" until other games published in 2015. Only time proved greatness of TW3. And to call something as boring and silly as TLOU2 "the game of the year" same yer when Cyberpunk is expected and probably sequel to the BOTW? How biased and out of touch with reality those "critics" should have been to make such statements? How their opinion can be trusted or even taken seriously? So in addition to forced unpleasant choices, dumb story, unlikable characters, short and boring gameplay TLOU2 through biased media reviews forces gamers to share developers opinion and political agenda. Buying this game is like buying slave master who'll turn you into obedient slave and will make you suffer. I suggest some gamers are prone to masochism but generally people wouldn't pay for their own enslaving and suffering. So if you are not masochist and not dreaming about sponsoring some rich and arrogant slave master don't buy TLOU2 and demand refund if you was tricked to buy it.

I`ve played many great games, but this one is easily one of the best ever. Its story and mythology (based on Sumerian mythology) is deep and involving, turn-based fighting mechanics is pretty interesting and characters are all different and well-written, with different motivations and attitudes towards each other and NPCs. It's a one of kind game - nothing like it exists and I fear nothing like this will be created again.

Once upon a time I was literally swept away from my usual favorites RTS', FPS' and TBS' into the RPG world by the groundbreaking Black Isle's Fallout 2 with its distinctive style, atmosphere, interesting story and characters. Then there were Planescape: Torment and Icewind Dale. With emerging Bioware it was the golden age of RPG genre. Black Isle is long dead now, but people from Black Isle Studios, like Chris Avellone, has gained authority among RPG fans and found themselves in another projects, still making good games, like KOTOR 2 and Neverwinter Nights 2. Though I wasn't a big fan of "new Fallout" including NV and of the Pillars of Eternity I've expected The Outer Worlds with much anticipation. And was utterly disappointed. The game stylistically reminds a lot about the good old Fallout 2 combined with NV with its retro-futurism and dark humor. Sometimes it reminds KOTOR 2, especially music score. And that's all the good things I can say about OW. Because as a story it is boring with flat, caricature characters and dull gameplay. Dialogues are pretty stupid, quests are trivial, characters are laughable and the plot is not involving. Moreover, you'll see a lot of modern Western propaganda here with its offensive politically correct Orwellian narrative in order to "educate" gamers. Honestly, I remember such rubbish ideological indoctrination through pop culture clearly enough from my childhood in the USSR to be fond by it. Thank you very much, but I've not volunteered to be used as Hong Weibing - enjoy your "cultural revolution" without my participation and not at the cost of my money. So if you are not Westerner and do not want to be insulted by their rotten ideology, if you value your intelligence, if you are looking for deep story, compelling characters, smart dialogues and engaging gameplay, than The Outer Worlds is certainly not for you. Better replay The Witcher 3 or play some JRPG.