Rob1986

This is a solid Zelda knock-off. The puzzles are fun. The open world is big and full of stuff to do. Combat is diverse, but not complex. I was a bit tired of heavy handed adventure games, and this really, really scratched my itch. This is light-hearted fun with no trace of high drama, preachiness or existentialism. Brush up on your Greek mythology before you play, or you won't get all the jokes.

This thing is a lot of fun. Combining TPS, rogue-like, into a AAA turned out to be a great idea. For me, the frustration of re-starting is minimal. The game actually does seem to allow progress. I could be wrong here, but it seems the chances of getting better weapons and pick-ups increases as you reach further into the regenerating maps. Maybe it's just random, and lucky, but I believe I've seen the map getting easier as my runs have gotten longer. Learning the trade offs of picking things up, and how to maximize chances for success is one of my favorite aspects. Your strategy is worth something here, and that's the way a to make a good rogue-like work. Two gripes: one, it absolutely would more fun to be able to save a run, than to lose a great one, because you have to leave in the middle. I have no problem starting over when I die, but to be forced to leave in the middle of an extraordinary run, because you have to is terrible. Putting the PS5 in sleep mode doesn't work if someone else wants to use the console before you get back. Second, the regen cut scenes shouldn't need to be skipped. You should have a setting to auto-skip everything except new scenes. I was excited for this game, and it more than met expectations.

I've been playing this game for a couple of months, so this is not a rush to judgement. I'm loving this thing. The only other game I've had this much fun with was Monster Hunter 3. Maybe it's because I love the grind, maybe it's the variety of challenges. When you have a hoard of dinos that allow you to roll through the tougher areas of the map you still have caves and other environments that require re-thinking your strategy. The # of creatures and their varied talents and abilities make the # possible strategies and approaches seemingly endless. I've logged well over 200 hours on this game, and will surely do 400 more. I've hardly touched online multiplayer Arks, and hardly have built anything interesting in terms of dwellings. It feels like I'm just getting started. The criticisms are valid IMO, but the fun of the game way more than overcomes those annoyances. The bugginess is real, and forces me to shut the game down and go back to previous save points at times. Dinos get stuck in caves, getting them un-stuck is frustrating. The grinding is another common gripe, but for me I actually like that aspect. I guess if you don't have the patience for that then this is not the game for you.

This gets a 9 from me because the graphics and realism of the game have taken a leap forward here. Also, because it's a Monster Hunter game, and is the best series of games I have played. Now I will proceed to gripe about what should have been better. 1)My favorite way to play the game is solo. I hate that online play is pushed and shoved down my throat. 2)The "story" is weak and the characters are uninteresting. 3)The worst disappointment is the open world. Yes, it's bigger, and more visually satisfying, and there are more nooks and crannys to explore, but this game IMO is not a true open world game. You cannot go anywhere you like. Essentially this is the old system of areas, but the areas are bigger and more detailed. The areas are still numbered, and you still have boundaries around each one. The difference is that you don't cut from one area to another. You have to actually walk or run from one to the other. An open world game to me means that if you see a location on the map that is inside the map you should be able to go there, and that isn't true here. There are points that cannot be climbed or descended, so you can't get just anywhere you care to go. All the complaints aside Monster Hunter is the best video game franchise I have played, and nothing has been done to put a dent in that. The endless number of collectibles, and the complexity and strategy around how to attack the monsters is still there, and presents an engaging challenge. There are some improvements too. I love the loadouts in the menu system. It's terrific to be able to create a loadout, so that I don't have to re-think each quest's provisions. I guess one good thing about the poorly executed open world is that it give the franchise somewhere to go for the next entry.

I quickly lost interest in hard mode. The "cosmetic" items are not any more than a curiosity, and the map enhancement is useless for me. But the trials have been really fun so far. They are challenging enough to make you say "hey, no fair!", but beatable. They force you to manage your health and resources much more carefully than is needed for the BOTW campaign, and you get more of some fun aspects like Aerial combat, and fighting in the dark. All of the trials have been good fun, and have re-kindled my interest in the game after having put it down a few weeks ago.

I've changed my score and review a bit after having played the game now for over 100 hours. The more I play, the better this game gets. It actually has become one of my all time favorites. The breadth of the open world is no less than amazing. Even with the amount of time I have spent I'm still finding myself wandering into new areas that I've never visited before. This is happening without any effort on my part to find new areas. Each piece of the map seems to have it's own character in terms of unique challenges, and side quests. The side quests are much improved over Zelda games of the past IMO. These are combat, problem solving, exploration type quests. Mostly gone are the bowling, fishing, shooting, arcade style quests which never held much excitement for me. I love that the game has been re-imagined. To me the franchise had grown a bit stale. When I played Wind Waker for the first time a couple years ago it was literally a chore to get to Gannon. I was actually glad to be done with that game. This is very much a fresh start compared to what had become the Zelda formula. I had a problem initially with the way the game looks, but the freedom and excitement the open world provides has swallowed those concerns. I'm truly looking forward to playing this thing for another 100 hours. There are tons of reviewers complaining about the breakable weapons, and shields, so I'll address that. There are loads new weapons which regenerate constantly. If you have a favorite weapon you can easily grind more of them. The breakability is neither a plus nor a minus to me. I like the suggestion one fan had to allow players to increase the durabillity of their favorites through upgrades. but I don't think the weapons should be unbreakable unless you make them that way. Another very common criticism has been that there are not enough monsters, or that there are only a few monsters in the game, and they are re-skinned again and again. I really don't get that at all. The monsters are excellent, have distinct personalities, which give the game tremendous variety, and if any of them are being re-skinned more than a couple times I have not noticed it. This is no different than in previous Zelda games where monsters like Lizalfos are re-represented at night as skel monsters, and monsters like the chu-chus have a handful of different species. This criticism is the most baffling one for me. One reviewer wrote that there are only about eight monsters in the entire game which are re-skinned again and again. I immediately counted 17 different types off the top of my head, and I'm sure that I forgot tons. The great thing about the monsters in this game is that each species has its own unique personality. Lynels are smart and incredibly tough. Lizalfos are idiotic and will actually go sniff bombs that you throw at them from a hiding place. I have had hours of fun just tossing bombs at them from behind rocks and watching their reactions. It's the gameplay that stands out and makes this game fun. I've been kinda bored(not totally bored, but a little bit) with some of the recent Zelda titles I've played, because they all tell essentially the same story, and they all use the same formula: obtain some fun tome and use it to traverse a dungeon and defeat a boss, rinse, repeat. BOTW makes the story seem fresh, and interesting. The dungeon formula is gone. This is something new and interesting. The open world gives you more freedom to have fun in a variety of ways, and to do it in my favorite way which is to come up with a strategy to defeat the enemy you want to go after. I like grinding or farming a bit to get the things I need before overcoming a boss. For me, that's the difference between a subdued "cool" and a "yeehaw" with both fists raised in the air. The enemies are often tough enough in this game to make it feel like you have truly accomplished something when you beat them down. Prior to this game the Zelda franchise didn't make that part very fun for me.

I've neglected to write a review for this game, but I feel the need to let people know how insanely fun this was for me. The campaign was enough fun by itself to get me to play it through twice, however the most fun I had was playing the challenges. I soloed each of them to 100% because they were such a riot. When I finished that I had not had enough, So I opened my wallet and bought all the DLC. Each challenge level required it's own strategy, and it took a fair # of hours to figure out a base strategy which I could re-use. I loved this thing, and may have to buy a Switch if only for the pleasure of playing Pikmin 4.

Sorry to say that this one was disappointing for me. I really have had fun with past paper Mario games. The battles here are too easy. I'm too deep into the game without being challenged at all. There is some nice humor, but I think the critcal reviews are more impressed with that than I was. I've obtained 3 of the paint stars, and I'm so bored that I've moved on to other games. I had high hopes for this game.

After spending 6-8 hours I'm declaring that I'm very satisfied with this game. It delivered most everything I wanted, a complex battle system with some nice carrots out there(skells) to be had after having fun with some hand to hand combat, a massive open-world with a variety of things to do and side missions galore, and a nice single player campaign. I have read much about the game's beauty, but I have to say the graphics don't quite hit the heights I was expecting, and I wish the game was just slightly more family friendly, but it's not bad on that front. A worthwhile purchase for a Wii U owner.

I'm loving this game. Collecting and crafting the various elements and exploring the virtual world is fun as can be. I have never played minecraft, so I have no frame of reference there, but I have to say I can't imagine playing the game without touch controls. It's too nice to be able to drag and drop without a mouse or joystick. This game was well worth the $10 for me.

This game is a better TPS. Call of Duty is possibly the most stale franchise in existence. Splatoon takes the genre in a wonderful new direction. The emphasis is as much on controlling the map as it is kills. It's possible to do damage to the opposition without hunting them down, or sneaking up on them. The game's charm is in the cuteness which, of course, no other TPS has any of that. Lack of content is a problem, but that is easily resolved with DLC packs and updates. Another issue is the inablility to play turf wars with more than one player in the same room.

There is a wide and varied # of suits which reminds me how much I liked that aspect of the first Lego Batman game. I love the gamepad in that you can play 2 player without having the screen split. Oh how I hate the split screen! Many have complained about the lack of an open world. Essentially Travelers Tales has add some of the challenges to the hub worlds(mini open worlds), but it's not as fun as having a big city to wander around. The first thing my son said was "when can we run around the city?" We are disappointed by the lack of open world. Everything else in the game has been fun.

I had to buy some of the Zen tables just to say thank you for the great Marvel tables they produced for Wii u shortly after the Wii u's launch. Before buying, I took a look to make sure there wasn't anything suggestive on the table that would embarrass me later, and didn't see anything, but did finally find one of Deadpool's girls hiding at the back of the table after playing for a few minutes. Oh well, that's the risk you take when dealing with comic book franchises. As far as the table itself I was immediately drawn in by the animations, and the challenging missions. This table is better than just solid. It captures the free wheeling, crazy attitude of the main character, and offers a fun experience. The table's challenges scale upward, and there's always something that's a little more difficult to master. Watch out for the semi-naked woman at the top of the table, but this is really fun pinball experience.

I had an enormously good time with Zen's Marvel pinball tables, so I couldn't wait for the new set of tables to be introduced to the Wii u platform. Walking Dead didn't live up to my favorite Zen tables like WW Hulk & Fear Itself. It's a solid virtual pinball experience with some fun side features like shooting Zombies with a rifle from distance, and the table within a table where you try to knock the ball into holes that you create. Where this table is not nearly as good as other zen tables I've played is in the missions. The payoff with the WD missions isn't as good. Glad to have more Zen tables available, but this isn't their best.

I'm really disappointed that Nintendo's next gen offering for one of the games that made the Wii special is this. A re-hash. The improved graphics and motion controls aren't enough to make it worth buying this game again. Online multi-player is a nice add, but I've had several problems including being dropped from games, and the controls don't work as well in the online mode for some reason. I'm constantly having to re-calibrate. This should have been a re-imagined, big release and a big win for Nintendo. Instead it's a disappointment.

I finally picked this game up, waited until it was $20, and I love it. It has been a long time since I've been this addicted to a game. I came into MH3 ultimate totally new, never having played a Monster Hunter game. I'm blown away by the amount of content. From the # and depth of weapon upgrades, to the # and variety of skills and monsters. It's overwhelming. As much as I love the game I can't see myself ever coming close to finishing. The game's faults are trival: the graphics are not the sharpest we have seen on the Wii U. The gamepad is wasted, and one fault that is actually quite amazing is that there is so much to learn and do that it's difficult to know what to begin using, how and when, so a better online guide would be in order, but perhaps Capcom wants it that way so they can sell their own guides.

This game isn't as bad as the critcal reviews would have you believe. My eight year old enjoys it. What's good about the game: the little critters are cute, it's kid friendly(because it isn't complicated, or too challenging). What's not so good is that the price is too high for a game with this amount of content. This has the amount of content I would expect from a $1.99 iOS app. If they knock the price down to 3.99 or I could rate this game a 7.

There is a lot of complaining about the game not being innovative, but, to me, this franchise didn't need a makeover yet. New level designs, new enemies, new bosses with the same great style of game play and better visuals is perfect for me. The cut scenes look great, and there is a little bit more 3D in this game than in DKCR, and I like using the game pad so much better than holding the Wii-mote sideways. I have to deduct a point for the abscence of useful game pad functionality. Nintendo needs to patch this game so that you can use game pad and the TV at the same time. How great would it be to have the person playing on the gamepad be able to go back or forward off-screen to thump a couple more enemies, or to grab some needed goodies? Even just mirroring the TV would be better than nothing. That way I wouldn't have to die when kids or wife walk in front of the TV while I'm playing. Pretty dumb Nintendo.

Since downloading this software a month ago I have been calling it Wii Fit because essentially it is Wii Fit Plus and a few new games and features. I had hoped for a complete remodeling of the Wii Fit concept, so what I got was disappointing. I would have preferred Nintendo take another year and then release something a lot more innovative. The good thing about Wii Fit U is the price. Since I already had a balance board all I had to pay for was the Fit Meter(a pedometer which tracks altitude as well as movement). So the new software and the meter only cost me about $25. Others have criticized Wii Fit for not offering enough challenge. This is still true. Wii Fit U doesn't offer much to challenge you, or to help burn calories quickly. I am using it as a hub to upload and track my calorie totals using the Fit meter. I can see how many calories I have burned over the past few days, and track my BMI for the purpose of hitting goals. That is about the extent of my use of the new stuff. The new features aside from the new games Wii Fit U offers are not much of a draw for me. I'm not using the gym feature. I am using the Fit meter goals, but they are quite lame, and I think I probably won't make use of those in the future. This software is very disappointing to me even with the price offered to owners of a balance board.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

I have to give this 10/10. Best pinball experience I've ever had. Physics lack nothing. Tables are gorgeous. The amount of content for the is the best aspect. The missions and scoring features are enough to keep you busy for many hours. Zen Studios put the tables on sale for 50% off. I bought five of them for $6.50. Feels like I should have paid at least $20.