Revadarius

I want to preface this with saying I played the game on PC via Xbox Game Pass. I played on Normal, and I speed-read all dialogue. That said, let's begin. You're probably wondering "Wow, why has this jackass given this masterpiece 6/10?". Well, that's easy: This game is short. It lacks content in a variety of areas, including story and character development. There's limited weapon/armour crafting/modification. The stats and perks are just about varied enough to be able to create a new character with a specific playstyle. I feel this game is meant to be played on a harder difficult to pad out and fluff the content. Maybe that was my mistake, but - referring to Obsidian's previous work - I should be wanting to play this game again. Differently, on a harder difficulty, with a different character type. Maybe a Melee/ Heavy armourer, stating into leadership for team play with my companions. But...I don't want to. The game play was fun *at first*. But after a while I realized... I hadn't really picked up the new debuff types, I wasn't informed (without specifically looking for it in the codex) about the viability of the elemental types. There wasn't many enemy types to mix up the gameplay either. Leading to a lot of sigh-inducing mission endings where I thought I'd fight a unique enemy as a boss. But nope, just a reskin. Or even the same old enemy I'd killed dozens, if not hundreds, of at that point. The crafting/modification/tinkering system is just... like a last second edition? There are not many weapon variations. I found possibly a dozen special weapon/armour pieces. Probably a few more. As well as a select few science weapons. And.... they're crap. Not in practice, but they cost so much to 'tinker' (i.e. level up, which gives increased dps) that they're not worth using after a few levels. Again, maybe on Supernova you'd use them. But it'd be an expensive investment because, as much as you can get lots of money in the game. You can only get it *once* via the quests because most drops arent' worth a damn. Armour/weapons barely sell for anything, and are better for breaking down for weapon or armour parts to be able to repair your items. There are only about a dozen or so mods types between guns and melee weapons. The modifications is very bare bones. And that's exactly the best way to describe a lot of mechanics in this game: barebones. Your companion quests, side quests, even the main story quests, enemy types, weapons, clothes, armour, mods... there's just enough of said mechanic or feature. Which is hilarious, because there's a huge variety of consumables and junk items. Too much even. To the point that it's a pain in **** to specifically search for an item. There are multiple consumables that all have the same exact effect. Be it + to mind/body attritube. Or +1 to personality, but -1 to 3 other stats. +25% health. DAMNIT, you need only 1 item with said effect, not 3 or 4. So your consumables become a confusing mess. Which leads me onto the menus. There's no sort option to seperate heavy/medium/light armour. Or to seperate light guns, heavy guns, 1 handed melee, 2 handed melee. Or a lock feature to stop you selling/scrapping certain guns. You have to be very meticulous in your menus when you're faffing around with gear. It could certainly be improved, it's one of the worst I've ever encountered in a game. Now, let's talk about the space map. You can travel to certain planets or satellites. But most of them are a *1 mission* area, which you won't have to visit again. Specifically, there's maybe 3 huge areas to explore (mostly hub areas) with 1 massive world, 1 large world and several small hub spaces that won't take long to explore. AND THERE ARE PLANETS ON THE MAP THAT MAKE IT LOOK LIKE YOU COULD GO THERE LATER, GIVING A FALSE SENSE OF VASTNESS. That's why it took me only 21hrs to complete this game. completing all but 1 mission (I botched a mission due to the order I did a specific set of missions in, no biggie though). Sorry to unload my disappointment with this game. It has fun gameplay, I enjoy the companion abilities and orders you can give them. The story is quite well written, along with the character dialogue. It's such a beautiful and extraordinary game. But I feel like it's lacking in nearly all aspects. I was raging about it being a "Game of the Year" contender. It certainly puts Bethesda's FO and TES series to shame, that's for sure. But I don't feel it reaches the heights of FO:NV. They tried to copy a formula but somewhere along the line they fell flat on their face. I would love a sequel where they improve. DLC or any form of expansion to this game would be insulting UNLESS they're going to improve all those areas I've mentioned. I did enjoy the game, it was fun and nearly a day well spent. And looking forward to eventually owning a little Sprat plushie. IF THEY EVER MAKE 'EM!

I'll be honest, I haven't finished the game. I'm about 6hrs in (at the pace of the game's auto command for moving through the dialogue). I understood it's be a VN, with RPG elements. I didn't realize to the extent how much dialogue that would include. It took nearly 2hrs before your first "battle" (the only time you have any real input into the game). Nearly 3hrs before your first "choice" (Which was basically click 'X' because you only had 1 option). And in 5hrs I've had 3 battles, and just came across my 2nd (though actually 1st) choice. I think the art works is beautiful, the voice acting (Though in Japanese) is magnificent and the music is soothing and creates the right atmosphere. But sadly, this game needs 1 thing - 1 simple thing - and that's English Voice Acting. Don't get me wrong, I prefer Japanese voices at time - but that's when not-so-much reading is involved. But with the amount of reading, and the poor displaying of some of it... it'd be nice to just listen to the story. Because there's too much text. I'd honestly prefer this entire story in book format. But a lot of the dialogue is unnecessary chatter, or over explanation of events. Which is the oddest, and brand new form, of 'fluff' I've come across in gaming. Honestly, regardless of what die-hard fans will say (the sort of people who would jump on the hype for this VN) I'd recommend the anime for anyone wanting the story in a more immersive and easy to digest manner, which - itself - is still a masterpiece. Granted, there are changes but I personally prefer the anime on that basis alone. If they ever bring of English VA's (which they likely won't) then I'll pick it up, but we're not getting the experience as it was intended because - unless you can understand Japanese - then this is just a pretty digital book. And yes, I love VN's. I've burnt through a few, most are short and sweet - and some are lengthy - but this "game" takes the biscuit, and the RPG elements may as well not exist. It's not deep, meaningful... it's entirely unnecessary to the 'experience'. 3/10. It's good, it's just hard to digest - and for anyone with dyslexia, or difficulty reading for long periods of time... it's going to take forever to get through this game, English VA would have helped appeal to a wider audience. It's a shame, I was hoping to fully compare it to the anime - and thought it would have much more **** to it, in term of it's RPG elements, and didn't realize the issue of lacking English VA. But now I know, and that was a risk I took when buying the game - and I hope I inform people who don't make a similar mistake.

I'm very late to this game, but I thought I'd share my experiences regardless. Firstly, I am not a DQ fan. I've no memory of every playing a game (due to them not really being available in Europe until the DS/Wii era... and that's about the time I gave up all hope on Nintendo). So finally getting to play a game, even if it's a spin-off to the main series, and on P.C. made me somewhat interested. And it came with that Square Enix seal of approval. Unfortunately, that aforementioned "seal of approval" has been tarnished greatly since around 2013. Oh yes, they've done some great games. Or atleast produced, if not developed, some great titles like Tomb Raider, World of Final Fantasy with their latest being Nier: Automata. But they've only done semi-decent ports of the FF series and some questionable games since. Such as Just Cause 3, Final Fantasy XV, Deus Ex: MD... I'm now on the fence when it comes to my fanboyism. Sadly, this is one of those games that hits in the 'questionable' section. From what I gather it's purely fan service. Which does nothing at all for me, being new to the series, so I guess my view point is fresh - especially when it comes to story, gameplay, mechanics, and the characters. And to begin with this game doesn't know what demograph it's meant to pander for. It has a comically anime style, as expected from the designs of Akira Toriyama (which are easily noticeable by the fact you get to play as a Goku look-a-like or an Android 18 look-a-like) and the story, and scenes and even the characters and their interactions are immature and wacky. Yet the dialogue, and complexity of some of the systems and side quests are beyond that of what a child, or young person may be able to comprehend. I know, it's not meant for them. But at the same time it doesn't feel like it's meant for an adult either, it tries to be a Jack of all Trades and, if you guessed it, masters not a lot. Though the graphics are brilliant. They're not detailed, nor realistic, but they are good and really place you within the previously stated wackiness of the game. And the music is alright, it's nothing to brag about. And I honestly don't remember any of it (having to fresh my memory) but it's adequate enough to set the mood of a fun and comedic hack'n'slash fanservice semi-rpg game. Sadly, the voice acting was abysmal. A few characters pulled it off, but it was either the dialogue was beyond comprehensible for a laymen, or it was just poorly written - and all the VA's didn't seem to have the same enthusiasm as each other, meaning they all seemed to be on various pages and the immersion of their characters broke often. Not all, some were consistently good through out. But your MC's (Luceus and Aurora) were offensively overacting to a level that wasn't even funny most of the time. Although I did have a thing for Alena and Kiryl and their semi-racist accents. And lastly the gameplay was pretty solid, and you did have a lot of versatility in characters, abilities and playstyles. Unfortunately by the time you're getting accustomed to the other characters, you'll eventually stream line yourself to using only 2 characters. One for easy farming to level up and get materials and currency, and the other for tanking away through any end game content *cough* bosses *cough*. And in all honesty the time and effort would drain your soul prior to actually accomplishing the end game content because it's not at all that rewarding, and you'll be sick of seeing the (though plentiful) re-used and somewhat limited enemies over and over. Unless you're a fan of mind-numbing repetitiveness, then this game will be up your street. 5/10 is what I can give it, and that's being plentifully generous. I somewhat hated the game, but I did enjoy the opening before I realized all the glaring mistakes and then everything relating to the latter half of the game. I do think it's a bad game, BUT it probably has some sort of nostalgia and fan service for those who are fans of the series or the genre of gameplay. And even then, they're going to be playing it through them rose-tinted nostalgia goggles.

This is the game Pokemon should be. Nintendo and Game Freaks should be ashamed of themselves. This is a combination of Kingdom Hearts, for visuals and feel. Pokemon as the games essence - RPG-based capturing and evolution. With all the characters, and creatures, being of previous Final Fantasy games. All tied up with an immersive world, story and characters. With crisp contemporary graphics, and well acted voice over work. If you like any of the aforementioned games, or all. Then this is the game for you. *EDIT* Okay, my original short statement was basically an FU to Nintendo, whilst also attempting to sum up the brilliance of this game in the shortest possibly way. That didn't go down so well, so here's another attempt. It's been a while now, and this game has aged... considerably well. Personally, 1 playthrough was enough. The story was brilliant, but the game itself dragged on waaaay too long. And that affects this style of game. Most Pokemon games (as referencing, because they are of the same genre) aren't that long, not need 30-50hrs+ just to do the main story. But this game does, and it means for most - as I'm presuming I'm in the majority - replaying the game again, for funsies, is a no-no and we're just going to keep our original save until the end of time. Especially if you've got all the mirages. Because there were some that were a "once only" deal, and you'd likely never want to try to get them again. But, that 1 play through was a great game, and I still remember it in detail. The hilariousness of the story, and the tie-in fan service of your favourite FF Heroes, monsters and villains was amazing. Done so well in fact that I was left wanting more. And I hope to high heaven there is a sequel. The game's style is cartoon-like, similar to Kingdom Hearts. But with added chibi-ness. Vibrant in colours, characters and dialogue that - though it has 0 sense of realism - is entirely immersive due to how warm and fun the game is. The gameplay does come across a little intensive, and confusing. At first. Especially if you've seen it out of context, or haven't been tutored. But it looks complicated, yet isn't, but has enough simple explanations with opening tutorials as well as depth, especially later in the game, to allow for you to challenge yourself on hard difficulties or with side bosses. Or heck, just trying to survive, meet mirage requirements, and to imprism them (basically, to capture). There's a variety of places from FFs old and new, as well as characters, but it's not so robust that it visits all areas, and uses characters from all games (meaning there could be a sequel, or atleast enough material for fresh new places if there was to be one. Here's hoping). And that the characters, and places, are alternate versions of those you know from their respective games, all existing in the world that WoFF is set in. To the point that there are characters existing in places outside their respective "game" (such as a character from FFV being in a FFI world, so on and so forth). And that there are characters from different points in the timeline of the same game. Which does work effectively at bringing to live some unusual, yet comedic, encounters between FF's old and new. All that aside, there is a variety of monsters. Know as Mirages. To encounter, imprism and record. With an extensive lore, through flavour text, for each you find that are equally as entertaining as they are interesting to read. Plus additional side quests that encapsulate a spin-off story of certain characters met along your journey, as well as a coliseum with it's own challenges, mini-games you fall across in-game and even online PVP. All of which have their own rewards. This game is bountiful in personality, and enjoyment. It's only weakness, as stated, is it's length. But it's new original characters, concept and use of an entire franchise spanning almost 3 decades is worth your time, and money. If Square had let you down with any of their past releases in the past few years (Just Cause 3, I am Setsuna, Star Ocean 5, so on and so forth) then this game will restore your faith in their ability to create new, fun and inspiring games. And let's hope for more from this series in the future.

Just to clarify. This is a great game, at first I thought it was brilliant. Amazing, even. It's certainly original, and ground breaking. The graphics are smooth, immersive and even overwhelming at times. The world is vast and plentiful. The story has major highs, but also a lot of pitiful lows. And the characters are overflowing with personality and, well...character. Unfortunately, the combat is a bit of a flustercuck (to be polite). It works, it's fun, it's simple yet expansive. But it has a lot of issues (usually with larger enemies, certain small/tight terrains and dungeons, and the camera angling is atrocious at times). And the story, as great as it could be (and after basically theorizing what the hell happened with the rest of the community) did have some impressive twists, turns. Hell, they were emotional. The major downside is that there's evidently huge chunks of this game just missing, and the story is short. The MCs are all the place in their chemistry and goals, as well as the fact the main Antagonist(s) aren't either shown, or their intentions or backstory fully explained. Well, to be truthful... their's just little to no air time for the important things that matter. The story evidently seemed an after thought, but the open world experience and it's major details are spot on. All-in-all this game is phenomenal, but it's let down by poor narrative structure. And time-wasting mechanics. There's fast travelling, but it's limited. So far after near 60hrs of gameplay, more than half of that has been in travelling time and other 'mechanics' that impede your pace of playing, forcing you to play at this game's pace. (There's an infamous section of the game SE themselves are going to address because it got so much hate over how pitiful and pointless it was, as well as the end-game portion). The 7/10 is the best I can give it, and that's being generous. For how grand it is at one end of the scale, it's let down by major issues at the opposite end. Hopefully SE rectify this, or atleast learn from this. But the story is short, sorta sweet... but extremely confusing because, hey!, there are entire portions missing. *EDIT* I've replayed this game recently. And I was disappointed. My opinion didn't improve, and it seems that without the hype keeping my love for the franchise alive... and already having prior experience with the flaws of this game. They were more evident. Unsure if the trauma was too fresh for me to play this game again so soon. But my non-existent love, though I did give it "reasonable" praise prior, was still not there for this game. Honestly, FFXV is a stain on this franchise. I have also replayed FFIII, IX and X recently and the nostalgia glasses weren't dirty enough for my views of these games to be jaded. I'm starting believe that outside certain FF titles, in the main series atleast, not all are amazing and that the name itself isn't as prestigious as I original thought it to be. I seemed to have left on a tangent there, but my point is that... this is Final Fantasy. And I've been, like many others, holding it to a certain regard. A high regard. Higher then what I expect of the main stream AAA franchises, or titles, that with all that man-power, time and money should be on an appropriate standard. That FF, sometimes, doesn't hit that aforementioned standard. Nevermind the standard I falsely hold in my mind. And FFXV is another game in the series that doesn't hit that standard, off AAA games in general. Sure, I praised it for various achievements. Even stating it was ground breaking. But looking back... it wasn't *THAT* good, nor groundbreaking. And it hurts me to say that because I am a delusional fanboy of SE... or I was. Until their recent run of bad games (even developed by, or published by SE). I know WoFF and Nier:Automata were some amazing titles they brought to us. But FFXV should be on a pedestal higher and it isn't, it's unfinished. Plain and simple. A rushed, incomplete mess that I've been critical of many other titles for, and even verbally punished. And FFXV deserves no less. It's not exactly a bad game, it's also not exactly good either. But it does have some strong areas, things I would love to see in future FF games - or other games in general - the open world aspect, a stunningly beautiful world that wasn't just immersive it FELT immersive. Grand monsters, and an improvement on the battle mechanics in some way or another. Honestly, I appreciate the 'hack and slash' gameplay that was intuitive due to the fact it was responsive, it automated chains depending on limited inputs... and no button spamming was necessary. This is revolutionary and should be a must in future beat'em ups and hack and slash games. It saves on needless stress, so you can game longer, and preserves the life of your controller as well as makes for smoother gameplay. So maybe it was intuitive afterall. But still only 6/10.

This game could have been better, it still can be. But Microsoft are just abusing this spin-off franchise for monetary gain. Is the game good? Yeah. It improves on the first, and has diversity (if you take the new free leader out of the equation). The campaign is excellent in terms of story, as well as the visuals and voice acting. The game play is more diverse yet still just as simple. And Blitz mode is a nice addition for burst-fire gameplay. Sadly, there's microtransaction which, regardless of how you look at it, is unforgivable. You buy packs and hope RNG is good - so it's effectively gambling, though this only affects Blitz it still means it can be a pay-to-win game type due to how the unit leveling affects their overall stats. And, though I bought the bundle with Halo Wars Definitive Edition and season pass, you're going to need to buy later leaders. Leaders have their own unique powers/abilities and special unit types. As well as pay for the rest of the story. Yes, the single player campaign doesn't end. It doesn't even leave it as a cliff-hanger for another game - it just stops. Evidently left wide open for you to purchase the season pass to buy the rest of the story. Luckily, I don't have to pay for that as I already paid for it up front - but I'm still offended by this practice as it plainly victimizes it's playerbase. Also, did I state earlier the gameplay was diverse? Well, it has the potential - but due to major balance issues the game plays 1 way, and only 1 leader is viable to use currently. Though it has just been patched the address that, it basically means the community is beta-testing the game so the developers can balance it. Okay, I understand it's importance... but this isn't, and never will be, a tournament worthy game. And, I'll get to the last issue... the bugs. I have the PC version and it's unplayable. So I stuck to play the XB1 version. Granted, the game plays just as nicely - if not better - on a pad. Especially for a layman who isn't used to mouse and keyboard, nor has the dexterity and knowledge for playing RTS. There's just so many bugs, though again a recent patch has addressed a lot - it's still far from perfect. I think, ultimately, this game could be a 7/10 - if it's fixed, patched and balanced to high-heaven. As well as new units and leaders eventually. But you're going to need to spend the price of 2 games for this 1 game in order to get the season pass, to have access to the rest of the content. And I can't recommend this game beyond that due to this, and the micro-transactions - even if they only affect 1 game type that I'm not even much of a fan off (due to, again, balance issues that haven't been addressed yet, they've barely scratched the surface). *EDIT* As of 21/04/2017. The state of the game has somewhat improved, with additional leaders to play with and overall patches. But it's only improved as now more leaders are usable, balance wise, but the game has been shown to be wildly more unbalanced. Now that using other leaders has become an availability, we've been able to see more balance issues that were basically hidden due to Forge's Jack Rabbit rush, and his broken Acc. Assembly and Rolling Economy leader power (that have been nerfed, too much in fact). There is a new leader out shortly, with some tweeks, patches, and new story missions. I'll update when I've tried and tested. But sadly, this game suffers from certain units being too effective as well as other units just not being effective to the point that they're actually a waste and have 0 place in the game right now. Leader powers still need to be worked on, heavily, and I personally believed that certain units need to be unlocked at higher, or lower, tech levels. I've changed my opinion of 6/10 to 5/10. This game is... boring. It's as limited in game play as the first one in term of unit selection. The balancing is atrocious, and there's either too little counters to certain units OR they don't counter effectively enough. That's outside of the plainly broken leader powers, and even units. And just balance issues with the leaders in general. This game doesn't feel as improved as it should be, especially when the 8 year old original still holds strong even today. And, though this is the XB1 version I'm critiquing... still can't cross play the P.C. version, it just won't run sufficiently enough and my specs are way beyond necessary. All of that in mind. I still enjoy the game, but unlike the timeless original that - even if it got repetitive, and even limited - it doesn't have the variety in units, unit types, counters, versatility and usability, etc. meaning you don't just see the same leaders, and different strategies, or different units. You see the same leader, the same strategy, the same units game-in and game-out. And for a game that's suppose to improve on the original, it doesn't play like it - even at higher ranks in ranked games.

This game revitalizes narrative-driven gameplay in videogames. Whilst toying with multiple genres, and sub genres, related to hack'n'slash and top down/side scrolling shooters and general bullet hell games. Through changes in camera angles, and various segments from flight units to hacking... this game expands magnificently on a concept the original Nier touched upon. Besides from it's diverse mechanics and styles of gameplay, the visuals play a vital role. Being absolutely stunning to the point of realism upon closer inspection, especially when it comes to it's character models. Square Enix have this unique ability to bring to life light and water effects upon characters, as seen in FFXV and SO5, as well as make clothing look weighted, and work as physically intend with movement, gravity and added weight with the inclusion of dirt and moisture. Though most of that can only be seen on 2B, it's still a minute detail that exemplifies Platinum Games' efforts with regards to Nier: Automata. The soundtrack to this title itself is a standalone masterpiece, fitting perfectly with the emotion and narrative of the game and helps shape the atmosphere wonderfully. Always 'kicking' in when you least expect it and with it always being the icing on a very wonderfully crafted cake. So much so it's entirely memorable and itself is another key reason that this game will someday be remembered as a classic. Now, story wise... this game is unique in the sense as it tells the story of an epic whilst using a variety of narrative styles that slowly unfold the game through the main story. The side quests, as well as hidden items and lore, expand upon the solid foundation to create a more wholesome world and breath life into characters. I found myself towards the end of the game remembering earlier side quests, and noting how they tied into the main themes of the game by the time I reached the ending, realizing how even some of the side quests had minor plot twists. Subliminally spilling the beans early on for you to only find out at the end... and ultimately realize what you've overlooked, and that's the true impact of the story. This always works due to the various playthroughs and narrative points of characters. Especially as there are instances where you (re)play the same part of the game, but in a different area or just from another character's perspective. Now, for some down points to the game. I found that the world just wasn't big enough. And that a lot of the sidequests were barbarically uninspired and dull, though there were some easily amazing side quests that I won't be forgetting any time soon. That being said, I spent 20hrs+ of my 50 running around like a headless chicken - although a lot of the running around can be "sped up" through certain mechanics later in the game - it doesn't devoid the sense that with majority of the side quests being boring and/or pointless, they were trying to make use of a small map by adding in a lot of fluff. Too much, unfortunately. And I found this game doesn't have the replayability necessary to allow so much fluff, as well such a short map. Granted, there's plenty of content - just on finding items, enemy types, weapons, pods and programmes, etc. But even at the end game there wasn't anything to do except a bunch of menial side quests and 2 secret bosses. The second being overly difficult and unrewarding (no in-game reward, or secret item/weapon, barely any expanse upon the lore). Another issue was the hacking mechanic was used too much, that a small segment of the game utilized the hacking mechanic and was plainly difficult. Mainly because it was seemingly uninspired, as well as the fact I'm objectively bad at bullet hell games, as well as subjectively hating them. And that hacking "breaks" the game, even allowing you to insta-kill the 3rd most difficult enemy in the game, and make light work of the last 2 with ease. Besides some crashing/stuttering issues on PS4, this game mostly ran perfectly. Only stuttering when trying to load large areas, though being fine with mass amounts of enemies and noise on-screen. Ultimately this game has etched itself on my emotions, scaring my fragile heart so as to never forget it. And overlooking some of it's flaws, as they're not game-breaking (maybe the hacking, let's be real), and that this game really is a modern classic that all should play, and that all should remember.

Ah, Gears of War. Another in the list of franchises Microsoft seems to be rebooting because they're either unable to think up something inspiring to help sell their console, or they're too afraid to push the boat out - in fear it may just be a wasted effort. Well, I guess they're sticking with what they know. Sadly, they seem to have forgotten what Gears was really all about. close quarters combat, inspired mostly by roadie running, wall bouncing and Gnasher fights. How unfortunate that assault rifles (particularly the Hammerburst) is dominating the current weapon meta. And that the maps seem to be designed with openness and visibility in mind...which really makes the glaring weapon damage (especially at range) a major issue, and easily noticeable. That being said, the maps seem overly familiar and uninspired. Lackluster, and don't really reflect the campaign, feel or theme of the game as a whole. Versus, however, is ridden with peer-to-peer connection, with the game feeling worse than the gameplay of GoW2 from 2008. To those who remember the abysmal issue of host advantage, and severe lag and want to relive that sweet bit of nostalgia, then GoW4 is definitely for you! Yes, the game advertises dedicated servers - yet I never played on one. The game also advertised cross play for Versus (along side campaign, and horde - to which it does have) but, unfortunately, it does not support this. Instead, online is riddled with issues where social is limited to 2 man teams, with difficulty finding lobbies. And ranked, from my experience, just being the same 2 dozen players, day after day, slowly moving up the ranks as we were shuffled about. That's when I could get a game - Ranked TDM was the only viable playlist, which took 5 minutes or more to find a match. I waited 30 mins or more for every other playlist, and never got a game. Which is a shame, because I'm partial to some KotH myself. Now, moving onto Horde. Horde is... boring. It's repetitive, with the only change being bosses on boss waves. This isn't helped by certain factors. Such as the maps. I can't really express my disdain for the games maps... but they just don't seem to work with the gameplay, the game types. They're so out of place. Ofcourse, there are new weapons - but I feel there are less weapons. Or atleast, noticeable weapons. Some, such as the boomshot and torque bow return, but they don't feel the same - the boomshot in particular. Some of the newer goodies, like the dropshot, or embar, seem 'too' good. Even in verses. However, I do like the class system in GoW4. Well, I like the idea of it... beside's TC's need for greed. Microtransactions. No, really. They're extortionate, and ridiculous. You can get duplicate of drops. The drop rates, especially for epics, has proven to be ridiculously low (Even on the 'better' and more expensive dropboxes). The in-game currency just isn't dropped anywhere near enough. TC and MS really dropped the ball on this one - the microtransactions are basically forced down your throat. They wouldn't be so bad. I mean, bounties are nice but all but pointless (especially the ones that give you pathetically low credit rewards) the skins are basically all too flashy, misplaced, and lackluster. No old-timey characters, or decent skins or current characters - most look like they were literally excreted on by a unicorn after it digested a rainbow. And are easily noticeable a mile away. Oh, and Horde skill cards are locked and can only be gained by these dropboxes. And you have to upgrade said cards (you need 1 to unlock it and another 19 to level it to the max level, which is 5). Some cards are even epic and rare. And you need 1 to access it...before you even have the option to create it from scraps. Scraps, which are a currency from breaking down cards, skins and bounties for less than a 1/5 of it's value. And with how hard it is to obtain cards, because the drop boxes are overpriced... you're not maxing out your horde cards any time soon, especially the good stuff. Campaign I can't really comment on, I didn't complete it - I lost all incentive as there's no reward for effort anymore. Everything is locked behind a large RNG grind wall / extortionately priced pay wall. Not that I even picked up GoW4 for the campaign, I didn't really get far into it - it just didn't grip me at all, though I can say the characters have more personality this time around. Even Old Man Marcus sprouted an ego at some point since GoW3. See, they can write good characters if they try. Although, on a positive note. The graphics look amazing, if you've got a decent GPU. Although that's mostly ruined by all the issues (see the forums for details). Honestly, avoid this game. This ain't my first rodeo with these XB1 exclusive ports, or the XB1 and it's quality in general. They think good graphics make up for lack of content and an unfinished game. They're wrong.