KB5K

Cool little Metroidvania with plenty of action and fun areas to explore. The art style is excellent, the combat is fun, and it's refreshing to play as a protagonist as unique and badass as Cherry. Frankly, it's cool to play as a female who doesn't look like a sex doll for a change. The only thing preventing this from earning a higher score are the bugs -- there are many, *many* bugs, most are just annoying, but some quest/trophy breaking. It's clear this game was not ready for release and needed another month of play testing. Still, even with the hiccups, it was a joy to play. Took about 30 hours on a very thorough playthrough.

PS5 version is incredibly bugged. Sometimes, the game just stops saving and you don't know it, so when you load your game the next day, you've lost 12 hours of progress. Sometimes, the game crashes or drops frames. I've had times where I suddenly couldn't move my character or deal any damage until I restarted. I've even heard others complain that it locked up their PS5 until they physically unplugged it. Developers have known about these issues for over a year and they're still not resolved. I want a refund.

The Good: The graphics are swell. The Bad: 1) Camera control during combat is a mess because you can't lock on to enemies. 2) Since the resources in the game are so limited, it's impossible to fully upgrade all your gear -- you can only fully upgrade maybe 3 out of the 6-7 weapons in the game. While this makes you choose your upgrades strategically, it also makes combat very repetitive because you're relying on the same 2-3 weapons and tactics for the entire playthrough. 3) The story is derivative. 4) Your carrying capacity is so limited that you'll spend a good chunk of the game fiddling with your inventory. 5) The game is less concerned with presenting a scary atmosphere and more into cheap jump scares. Often, enemies jump out of nowhere, hitting you with unblockable attacks that are less scary than they are annoying. You literally can't avoid taking damage from these surprise attacks and you can't see them coming to avoid them. 6) The controls are just bad. Often, when I wanted my character to run, he wouldn't on the first attempt. It takes a full 2 seconds to turn around and look behind you. Switching weapons mid combat when you have more than 2 it's a real pain. Etc. 6) I could go on-- wasted potential of their cast, lame upgrade system, and overall just not very fun. This game is destined for the bargain bin.

If you like PS3-level graphics and overplayed, prototypical JRPG tropes, then you'll love Tales of Arise.

I've just earned the platinum. Here's a review from someone who's seen every inch of this game: Good: Solid action, sound, graphics, and controls. Bad: The story was disappointing, lack of a save option, bugs and crashes are FREQUENT, padded length via phony third act, and ENDLESS grinding for trophies. Overall, Returnal is a" good" game that could've been GREAT if not for some poor choices from the developers. First, they really, truly need to add an ability to save; let it erase the your save when/if you die, like other Rouge-like games do; I've lost my progress probably 10-15 times due to crashes, power issues, and random updates. Oh, and run-breaking bugs, like the time I randomly clipped through a floor i the 6th biome and somehow landed on a surface below the game map, unable to get back up, so the only thing I could do was abandon my perfect run and restart. Then there's the time my audio completely cut out in biome 6 and I had to restart. Oh, and the time the game crashed and my save data became corrupted almost immediately after finding the rarest collectible in the game. All of this is in addition to normal dying, which will happen A LOT; the game is very challenging when it's working properly, making it damn frustrating when it's not. Then, there's some equally frustrating design choices; beating it multiple times to see the true ending felt like a chore. While not spoiling anything, you basically need to play every level over and look for collectibles, then beat the final boss again to finish the "third act" and see the secret ending --- the payoff for all your hard work REALLY isn't worth the high level of frustration you will endure to get that ending. It's also unfortunate that the developers chose to make you essentially replay the ENTIRE game in Act 3, which only padded the campaign runtime while adding absolutely nothing new. It's a third act in name only. Earning the platinum was a painful, tedious grind that was NOT FUN at all; it required playing through the same level over and over again for days until I could get a certain room to spawn that had a collectible item needed for the trophy. Literally days upon days of grinding. Overall, this game has many fun moments, but just as many bugs and poor design choices that make it feel like a real drag at times.

Game of the year, you say? ...Are you kidding? I can't believe the number of reviews praising the game's graphics. This easily has the worst textures I've seen in a triple-A title this console generation. The only exceptions are the early and late game environments, possibly due to the low-key lighting, making the texture issues less noticeable. In many of the game environments, textures lack simple bump maps. They're insultingly bad for fans of the original who have waited decades to see this project come to fruition. The character models are very nice, but that's about it. There are moments when the textures are literally comparable to PS2, especially in the sector 5 junkyard area. That's not an exaggeration. The side quests are throwaway "fetch quests." The hard linear nature of the game takes away from the experience of the old final fantasy games that opened up near the end, giving you the chance to explore the world and build your characters. That never really happens here -- you can only explore one sector of Midgar near the end. The combat is fun at some moments and a klunky mess at others. It's so easy that you'll never face a significant challenge in the game (i died 3 times in my entire playthrough). Because of this, there isn't the necessary level of strategic depth that the original had; for example, I never had to use an item to remove a status effect because they rarely affected battle in a significant way. The most common ailment was the toad status, which you can ignore for literally a few seconds until it wears off naturally. Never used a "remedy," "smelling salts," "echo screen," etc. By extension, status defense materia and skills are arguably useless. The worst part of the battle system by far is the camera; despite changing the in-game settings, enemies frequently go off screen or block your view, and when you try to reposition the camera with the right stick you end up targeting a different enemy. We had the same camera issue in the last single player final fantasy title, and SE is simply not learning from past mistakes. Fanboys will jump on the bandwagon, but those who judge the game according to current standards and not based on nostalgia for the original will have a hard time calling this a GOTY contender. P.S. Worth noting that there are tons of annoying narrow passageways you need to squeeze through in this game. They're almost constant. Of course, they're really hiding loading screens. This game should be much better optimized given that it's offline, segmented into chapters, and so incredibly linear. Maybe SE should worry less about making Cloud's hair so damn pretty (his hair literally has collision detection) and worry more about building a game with functional environments that don't force you through narrow passages every 10 minutes and textures that don't look like they're 15 years old. Maybe actually texture a rock or a door every now and then. Just a thought.

I think Metacritic must be broken. You see, at the time of this writing, Death Stranding is scoring an 82%, which would indicate that this is a good game. And there's simply NO WAY that's even close to resembling reality. Here's a spoiler-free checklist for you: **Endless fetch quests? Check. **Lots of walking over large featureless unpopulated spaces? Check. **Ridiculous, pretentious, and impossible-to-comprehend story? Check. **Gameplay mechanics designed solely to aggrivate the player? Check. **Shameless in-game corporate advertising? Check. **Poorly designed, ridiculously detailed in-game menus that you can BARELY read because the print is so small? Check. **Most of your time spent managing inventory? Check. **Meaningless collectibles (e.g. "memory chips" that let you read factoids about random real-world things like motorcycles, action figures, and Kojimas favorite movies)? Check. **Not really exciting, not really scary, not really interesting--but generally just a depressing atmosphere? Check. **Seemingly endless amounts of cutscenes, even when performing routine actions? Check. **Artificially extended game length (Example: "Sam, before you can continue the main quest, you need to help these 5 meaningless NPCs with their fetch quests!")? Check. Another example: you're also forced to run around in circles throughout an empty environment during the credits for 30-40 minutes while the plot is explained to you -- because the plot is convoluted nonsense and Kojima *knows it -- and because it adds 40 minutes of "gameplay." **Generally BORING? Oh yeah, that's a check. Come on, Metacritic. Do better. This game is a 5 out of 10 at best. There are some good qualities: The graphics and acting are great. It's well-optimized on the PS4 and my experience has been entirely bug-free, even after playing through the entire game and completing almost all of the side quests it . It's ambitious and strives to be artful and make a deeper statement about humanity. But that's the most it has going for it. One could forgive poor gameplay if there existed an interesting and engaging story. One could forgive a poor story if there existed fun and interesting gameplay. However one cannot forgive an absence of both.

Underrated. Some of the user reviews I'm reading on here are utter nonsense. One "user review" gave it a zero and their main gripe was that the publisher didn't send advance copies to game review sites. Literally giving it a zero not because of the quality of the game or work of developers, but because of the actions of the publisher. Whatever. I could rant about people who are mad because it's not "Doom 3 Part 2", and because it's not what they expected they're emotionally rating and giving a zero score ("because if it's not what I expected, then NOTHING can be good about it!") but I won't bother. Here's my review of the campaign. I'll be honest - I was sure this game would be terrible when I saw the first in-game footage. I was wrong. What it does best: The action is the #1 main attraction of DOOM, and once you accept this game for what it is (not DOOM 3, not a horror game), you'll thoroughly enjoy each encounter. Understand what this game's goal is; intensity. DOOM is at its best when you're in a large room surrounded by a horde of hungry demons. The action is viceral, and the glory kill system provides a great risk/reward mechanic. You're always outnumbered and your health depletes fast, but glory killing a foe provides a moderate amount of health just when you think you're done for (think rally from Bloodborne). The guns and the upgrade system are very well designed. Performing unique and creative feats with your weapons allows you to unlock their top tier upgrades, forcing you to experiment with the entire arsenal so you're not just playing through the entire campaign with your one favorite weapon. The level design, secrets, and unlockables are all masterfully well done. The controls are also very well tuned. What it does well: At first, I didn't like the speed of the game. However, when the game started introducing larger firefights, I began to like it more. That said, the speed is great fun when you're in the middle of a firefight, but not so great when you're moving through the many tight corridors of DOOM. The graphics are also very very good - some of the best on PS4 - but, it might be kinda hard to take in the sights and appreciate the soft shadows and subsurface scattering when you're literally moving at 30mph through the environments. Regardless, the graphics are great and my playthrough seemed locked at 60FPS consistently. One major point that ID deserves kudos for is allowing FOV adjustments from the settings menu. As someone who gets motion sick from many FPS games, this is a godsend. Thank you. Where it can improve: The music tends to pick up when a firefight begins. Sometimes the music is good, but most times it's pretty bad. I listen to quite a bit of metal and I've rarely heard such discordant industrial mess. Bring back the music from DOOM3 that was so clearly taken from Lateralus/Tool. :) I played the game on ultra violence (hard) the first time and didn't find it difficult enough. Therefore, I'm assuming the standard difficulty is way too easy. Last, and this is my own personal preference; I felt that the creatures were very well designed, but they seemed a bit too "comicy" (think Joe Madureira but not quite so exaggerated). I would've preferred more realistic looking demons; regardless, they look cool. SUMMARY: DOOM 3 had an amazing and horrifying atmosphere, but this new DOOM trades that for more enjoyable gameplay. This is more fun than DOOM 3. It's a game for gamers. 9/10.

To enjoy this game, you must: A) accept it as dumb, mindless, repetitive fun, and B) realize that it's not a love letter to American action movies (as IGN describes it), but rather a satirical view of America's foreign interventions. In this game, there's quite a bit of anti-American sentiment, and missing that is missing a rather big point the developers were trying to make. This is very evident in the level descriptions, where America is portrayed as xenophobic, warmongering, and politically inept. Here are examples: "Iraqistan? F#$k Iraqistan. Americanize them!" (--Obviously a reference to Operation Iraqi Freedom) "The people from this country look, speak, and act differently than we do. We've gotta move fast!" "Yourkraine? More like OURkraine." (sic) "Something something bipartisanship something something unilateral action." As an American, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with this. I actually think it's hilarious. Just pointing out that we're not in on the joke here; we are the joke. Gameplay wise, it's fun but best with a party. Some of the character abilities arent well balanced (Indiana BROnes is useless), but overall pretty varied and interesting. I particularly enjoyed the desperate attempt to fit a "bro" into names that can't possibly be used for that pun, such as Ellen Ripley.

I really wanted to play this game, but after purchasing and within 5 minutes of playing it made me incredibly motion sick to the point where the game is unplayable. Apparently this game causes simulation sickness for a lot of people who don't typically suffer from it, and the dev is working on a patch. Making a game comfortable to play and knowing how to make a 1st person game have the correct FoV to keep the player from barfing - this falls under design competency. Until this is fixed, the game is literally unplayable for about 33% of gamers. Once it's patched, I'll update my review.

After putting 60 hours into this, here's my objective review: THE GOOD: - Best stealth mechanics I've ever played - Countless ways to conquer an objective - Missions have real replay value to achieve different objectives and unlockables - The graphics are beautiful. Zero framerate drops on ps4 - The controls, whether horseback riding, driving, or shooting, are expertly fine-tuned - There is an abundance of subtle humor (lie down while in a cardboard box), and the 80s music seems to fit the scenarios in funny ways (ex. Being able to assign the track " Only Time Will Tell" or "Maneater" to your helicopter music). THE BAD - The narrative pacing is poor. The main story is spaced out by many irrelevant main missions which don't feel meaningful. If you're a gamer that likes feeling invested in a deep, dramatic story, you may be disappointed. You'll get more drama in 30 minutes of GZ than you'll get in 15 hours of TPP. - There is a big reduction in cutscenes. This may seem like a good thing, but remember that MSG is the godfather of cinematic gaming. The lack of cutscenes makes this feel like less of a MGS game, compounds the lack of narrative pacing, makes the player feel less invested, and ruins the opportunity for the star voice actor to make an impact. - The story is utter nonsense. There's no defending it. From japanese grudges turing people into demons, to flaming unicorns and flying flaming **** people who survive on ****'s utterly ridiculous. There's a limit to how fantastic an espionage game should be, and I believe the original MGS reached that limit. - There is a feeling of redundancy when you're forced to redo missions in the same areas you've secured previously. - if you're a non-lethal player, the game begins to feel very repetitive: tranq the enemy, fulton extract them, repeat. You will become VERY reliant on this system, which seriously detracts from the multiple ways to approach an objective. - Microtransactions. Here's where I draw the line, and promise to never purchase another Konami game. Let me explain, I won't spoil anything: Konami introduces a microtransaction system, strategically, after you've invested dozens of hours in the game and are heavily invested. Many of your resources at this point can be stolen from other online players, and the only way to defend what you've worked for is to either A) spend real money expanding your online defenses, or B) spend real money on INSURANCE to protect your assets, or C) unplug your Ethernet cable. The problem here isn't the invasions-- it's the extortion of money out of the player, and if you own GZ, you've already invested over $80 in this game. If you don't have PS+, you're even more limited on how you can defend your bases. For example, I didn't purchase insurance or participate in the online side at all. When I loaded my game one day, I loss millions of GMP (in-game currency) that took me dozens of hours to earn. Forcing me to purchase insurance to prevent losing what I've worked for is literally low-level extortion, and no one should encourage Konami by participating in such nonsense. If you don't care about story, and are willing to pay for microtransactions, then this game is a perfect 10. If you really value story, and believe microtransactions are a cancer on the industry, you'll be disappointed.

After all of the hype, I caved. I bought this game full price, brand new, and poured about 30 hours into it. Now I'm giving up. I can't explain how this game has garnered such praise from the gaming community, even to the point where it's considered a game of the year nominee over games like Dark Souls 2, which clearly deserve it. THE STORY: You're the chosen one. You and only you have the power to stop evil from taking over the land. Sound familiar? It's a cliche that you can get over, sure. The remainder of the story, however, is painfully boring (I've fallen asleep several times while trying to play through this game). It doesn't help that there is a mountain of lore that you really need to know to understand why things are happening. So if you haven't played dragon age in a while, you'll find that you're spending a lot of time either reading the in-game codex, or pressing pause to look something up on a wiki somewhere. GRAPHICS: Aside from nice light and shadows, DAI is graphically equivalent to a last-gen title. Speaking specifically to the hair design- I have never, ever, seen a game do this so poorly. I know Bioware has a long history of "**** at [designing] faces" (their words, not mine), but the faces are actually quite well designed, and the character builder is pretty cool. The artist that designed the hair, specifically, did an extremely poor job, to the point where it's distracting. There's an article on Kotaku where users took a poll, and over 70% of players eventually restarted the game (some 10-20 hours in) because they simply couldn't stand to look at their character. It's really just that bad looking, and at this point I can’t understand why Bioware hasn’t worked to strengthen this admitted weakness of theirs. Graphically, environments aren't bad, and when the game eventually opens up they can be quite beautiful, albeit short of the "next gen" feel of other PS4 titles. Facial animation needs work; since Bioware prides itself on deep, enthralling stories, they should really put more stock into this area and take a page from LA Noire / Beyond Two Souls. Selling emotion is key to an engaging story, and sadly these characters are emotionless. GAMEPLAY: The environments in this game can be pretty vast and diverse, so there is a real sense of exploration. However, with dozens of "fetch quests" (many of which are issued to you even noticing, simply by picking up loot) the actions you take in the game don't feel meaningful, and thus, the quests aren't fun. It’s more of a list of things to do vs. things you’re interested in exploring. The combat system has some merit, but it’s ultimately a mess; it becomes very hard to keep track of who is doing what. On more than one occasion, I noticed that in the middle of a battle, one character was stuck behind on the edge of a cliff or on a rock- the AI was trying to rejoin my group but couldn’t. The "behavior" programming system (this allows you to automate character actions) falls very short of achieving what the gambit system in FF12 achieved, being a neutered version of what Origins used. There is a pointless inventory restriction on your characters, meaning you need to backtrack a lot to sell your valuables and free up inventory space for new loot. This adds no deeper strategy to the game, only the chore of backtracking. Technically, I’ve experienced a few hiccups. My game crashed repeatedly when I tried to respec one of my characters. Overall, this is a mediocre RPG with a generic, boring and bloated story, poor design choices, and semi-enjoyable gameplay mechanics. I wouldn’t recommend it, and honestly, it’ll probably be the last time I give EA / Bioware $60.