braeden

This game makes me sad and frustrated at the same time. Being third installment of great adventure series it has so much potential of being fantastic game. And it ends up being mediocre at best. To sum it up: 1) Nothing of consequence happens story-wise in Books 1 & 2. Most characters are uninteresting, dialog is mediocre, themes and story arc from original Dreamfall are not touched at all. Too much pointless running around with no apparent reason. Very little any real content. 2) The facial and other character animations are just bad. Even when the narrative tries to convey some kind of emotion, the characters just stand still with blank expression on their face. The original Dreamfall had better animations 10 years ago. Also very little humor. No jokes, no witty dialog, nothing. The overall tone of this game is very monotone. 3) Point & click problems. It's very easy to miss objects you can interact with. Often you know what you're supposed to do, but just can't figure the where to click or the correct order of clicking things. 4) Slow graphics. Except the animations, the game actually looks quite nice. Unfortunately it has some performance issues. Even in high-end system it can have framerate issues and in many older systems it might be pretty much unplayable. This might be alleviated in future, if they decide to change to newer Unity version. To be fair, the Kian story arc has some interesting parts even in Books 1 & 2. Also, while Book 3 mostly has the same problems as the previous two books, the story starts to pick up some speed. The game starts to address the story arc from original Dreamfall and even the dialog seems the get better (and wittier) at times.

This is probably best story-rich game I have played in a while. Story, characters, atmosphere... everything is near perfection. The gameplay itself is all about character interaction and making choices that will have consequences later on. The trick is that you can reverse the time (to certain extent) and remake those choices. The mechanics for this work great, although the game would probably be ok even without this gimmick. There's minor issue which isn't a biggie, but worth mentioning: The choices you make are divided to minor and major ones. The game logic is that you can reverse the time, but still keep items you acquired previously. This basically allows you to first select path that gives you some items and the select some other, more favorable path while keeping the items. However, for major choices this doesn't work which is somewhat inconsistent and even confusing at first.

In short, it's a simple hack & slash done right. If you like to kill hordes of enemies, gain experience, find lots of loot and have some great boss fights, this is the game. Visuals and overall playability are just great. That being said, don't expect deep story, interesting dialog or anything like that. The story is mostly irrelevant and there really isn't any NPCs to interact with or stuff like that.

Length and difficulty are pretty much similar to previous episode (harder than 102 and 103). Compared to previous episodes there are more puzzles that you basically just have to figure out by trial and error. Also one puzzle I missed just because of critical item was semi-hidden (which hasn't been very typical to this series). All in all the game is still quite logical and most puzzles are hard just because they involve multiple steps.

Compared to previous episodes (especially the 103) the difficulty level is again what you typically expect from this type of games. Most puzzles have multiple steps you need to figure out before solving them. So expect spending more time figuring stuff out or taking few quick peeks to walkthrough (if you're impatient like me). Length is also bit longer than previous two episodes (mostly because higher difficulty). Otherwise no big surprises.

Somewhat shorter and easier than the first episode, but story-wise much better (more wacky stuff). Also in 103 some elements are getting a bit repetitive, but in this one everything still feels fresh. My personal favorite of the first three episodes.

This one is a bit tricky to pin down since it's the first episode. It's so long a ago I played the original game it's hard to make any meaningful comparison between them. I do however get some added nostalgic value out of this just because it's Sam & Max game and mostly very well made one also. As stand-alone game it gets many things right. Dialog is funny, the environment and characters are wacky (although maybe somewhat less so than in the original game) and most puzzles can be solved without resorting to walkthrough every five minutes. Items are also used sparingly and are typically easy to find. There's really no puzzles where you have to guess which two of your 50 items need to be combined or situations where you can't find some critical item since you clicked wrong pixel. This is the longest of the three first episodes (haven't played the rest yet). Mostly because you spend a bit more time on exploring and learning stuff. Still, it can easily be played in one evening. Story-wise this might be the weakest of the three, but it doesn't really matter at this point.

Probably the worst of the first three episode. It took under two hours to play without checking anything from walkthrough (and I usually **** at adventure games). Also this episode doesn't shine on story department quite like the episode 102 did. So basically you get less of everything. Still enjoyed it and would recommend it.

Pros: Unlike in 'Old world blues' you actually get ammo, stimpaks and other basic stuff pretty nicely. The enemies (although generic and boring) are also better balanced and it doesn't take gazillion shots just to kill one. Cons: Pretty much everything else. Level design is boring, dialog is boring, lots of pointless running around and all your equipment is taken away (stuff you get is very basic). To add to the fun, you have exploding collar on you neck which explodes every time you fail to destroy or avoid transmitters placed everywhere (which often are more or less hidden). Basically lots of repetition and loading save games. So much fun! If you want to try the DLCs I would recommend the 'Old world blues', which is easily the best (read: least bad) one. If you like it, then maybe try the other ones.

Easily the best DLC for New vegas (which really isn't saying that much). Pros: The plot was pretty solid and had right amount of "wackiness" to it. The length (< 10 hours) was also quite nice, considering you have to interrupt the main plot when playing this. You also get some ok bonuses on completion. Cons: Some balancing issues what comes to difficulty level. I found the enemies to be too though. Basically you normal weapons do minimal damage against them and you have to use the special weapons provided by the DLC. These work only marginally better. You're also constantly low on ammo and aids, which isn't all that fun. This whole thing felt a bit artificial and forced. There are also some repetition in some quests that were boring and felt like a cheap way to add more length to the game.

Making decent sequels for successful games isn't easy. Sequel should pay some kind of respect to original game, but also offer new content and be self-contained enough to not feel like bunch of recycled ideas. New vegas manages to find this balance nicely. Basically you get more of the same Fallout goodness and it still feels fresh enough to keep you interested. New feature worth mentioning is the faction system, where you gain reputation (good, bad or mixed) based on your actions. Different groups will react differently to you, based on your past actions towards them. Every group will also have their own conflicting agendas and it can be hard to try please them all. I think the system worked quite nicely and added some depth to the game and character interactions. Only major shortcoming are the DLCs which pretty much ****. I guess 'Old world blues' was near decent, but interrupting the main plot for ~10 hours to do something completely unrelated just didn't work for me. Also honorable mention to 'Lonesome road' which was boring as hell, but at least you could quit playing it without completing the whole DLC.

Don't starve is nice little game with very unique look & feel. It's immersing, addicting and has tons of stuff to do and explore. The basic idea is to gather/produce resources and upgrade your camp in order to survive in wilderness. The main problem is that this game becomes very repetitive after a while. The way to success is basically just to gather and build as much stuff as possible which isn't all that entertaining in the long run. Also when you die, you really die and have to start from the beginning (with few exceptions). And then you have to do same steps all over again... Still, you'll probably get more fun out of this than from many other titles. The game is also quite cheap so you're guaranteed to get at least your money's worth.

This game can be wholeheartedly be recommended to all South Park fans. Everything related to South Park theme is done just perfectly and it really shows how closely Matt and Trey have been involved in the game making process. There are still some issues and most of them are related to actual game mechanics. Main annoyance for me was the key combos and quick time events required to perform combat moves. As often is the case, these just don't work well on PC. After a while I mostly get used to them, but there were some I failed to do almost every time. Some of the puzzles can also be a bit annoying. These basically require you to use correct abilities to correct hot spot. Especially early in the game when you don't know how all the abilities and hot spots work, you might get stuck for a while. The main problem here is that game doesn't always explain itself very well and you have to figure out yourself how many game mechanics work. In the end, these issues are relatively minor and were out-weighted by all the great South Park stuff. The game length was ok. Maybe 15 hours or a bit less on average if you do most of the quests. Less if you just run through the main plot. (The game references the show extensively. Even stuff that happened during early seasons. If you haven't watched the show I wouldn't recommend this game to you. Also if you're easily disgusted or offended, I'd play something else.)

Don't get me wrong... this is a really well made game. Especially considering I write this review after 7 years of its release. It has however few annoying issues. First, the AI of your own troops is basically non-existing. Especially in fast-paced maps controlling every minor detail of your troops becomes simply frustrating. Also, the base building doesn't really fit well to this game. Fixed amount of troops plus triggered reinforcements would have worked better than some artificial troop limit that gets maxed out in worse possible times.

Alice Madness Returns is one of those games you would really want to like. With some polishing and stronger story-telling it could have been great game. Unfortunately, as it is, this game is very mediocre in almost all aspects. It has shallow story and characters, bad dialog, repetitive gameplay, messy controls and camera that can't quite keep up. The only strong point of this game is visual design. Few games manage to great so unique and surreal visual experience. Unfortunately even this is ruined by low texture quality. Overall visual feel is a bit messy and blurry. If you like platformers and don't expect anything exceptional or deep, this game might be okay buy. Also if you liked the original game, this has very same feel in it. Otherwise, I would skip this one.

I played KOTOR when it was originally released 10 years ago and thought it was great. So when I found it on Steam I of course had to download and replay it. And what do you know... it was still great. If you like RPGs, story-driven games and/or Star wars stuff, you should try this one out. Some words of warning. I didn't really mind the graphics (after setting every graphics setting to max), but if you haven't played any older games, it might be an issue for you. Especially character and facial animation are very simplistic by today's standards. The game also has problems with Win 7. There are some instructions how to get around this, but at least for me, it took some experimenting before the game started working.

Dragon Age: Origins Awakening is a decent sequel for the original game. Basically, every aspect of this game is just fine, but not quite as good as in the original. Characters are weaker, plot is weaker and the level of polish just isn't quite there. Also, while some of the new classes and skills are useful, the skill system starts to become a mess with higher level characters having dozens of skills. One thing to mention is the subgame of managing your soldiers and keep. On several occasions, you are given options where you want to place your forces. You can also do some minor upgrades to your keep. In the end, however, it's left unclear how these choices affected to anything which wasn't very satisfying. The are also some problems with setting the tone/mood of the game. E.g. the joining ritual is near comical (In original game it was anything but). There's no feeling of desperation, like in first game and lots of stuff feel pretty lackadaisical. Awakening also contains lots of Bioware style sidequests, where you run around and gather some stuff without any relevance to anything. All in all, the game was still fun to play. It wasn't really anything too memorable like the original game, but it's worth buying if you get it cheap.

I haven't played the first Bioshock and don't know how it compares to this sequel. As standalone game Bioshock 2 has unique dark atmosphere and some interesting design choices. Bioshock offers just right amount of different weapons, which all have they uses. On the other hand, I only used selected few plasmids although they all seems useful enough. Battles are typically very intense and lots of fun. Especially big daddy sister fights and when you have to protect little sisters from swarms of enemies can be exciting. Main problem with this game is the plot and storytelling. At best, the story is messy and uninteresting. Most of the dialog and NPC characters are left very superficial. The inherent weirdness of the game also makes it hard to relate to any of the main characters and I didn't find myself caring too much of any of them. If you find copy of this game cheap, I would recommend it as fun shooter with some RPG elements. If you're searching for game with good story, this ain't it.

I really tried to like this game and it does have some things going for it. It looks good, it has very open maps and the premise (being stealthy assassin) sounds great. Unfortunately this game is very repetitive. Basically every mission is exactly the same and every map has the same scripted things you need to do and can do. This gets old somewhere around third mission. I originally expected something more like Thief series. Optional side quests like "collect zillion flags around the map, to get nothing concrete" also don't help. It's also mind boggling why we need convoluted double plot. You see, all the assassin stuff actually happens inside this guy's head who is kidnapped by some organization in present time and placed inside machine that can play his "genetic memory". I really can't see any relevance or added value between this and the game's central idea of being medieval assassin. Granted that I didn't finish the game so I don't know if it starts to make sense at some point. All in all, the game is ok. Unfortunately, there are tons of better ways to spend your time than this game. It offers nothing exceptional or memorable.

Dragon Age is without a doubt one the best modern RPG games. It has exceptionally strong story and good character design. You also get constant feeling of desperation and imminent doom as the story progresses. The game is also more realistic than NWN series and geared more toward mature audiences. This also shows in difficulty level which can at first be notable. My main (and relatively minor) problem with this game is the character development system, which is dumbed down from NWN. I personally liked NWNs D&D (Dungeons & dragons) system and character classes (which could be combined quite freely) very much. I do realize, however, that for most player this system didn't give any added value and is overly complicated when targeting larger audiences. One thing to mention is that the game is exceptional long by modern standards. It gives easily 40-50 hours of playtime. Maybe even more depending on your play style. All in all, it's an exceptional game and offers really good value for your money.

Fallout 3 is immersive, dark and fun RPG game that has tons of things to do and explore. The game takes place in post-apocalyptic Washington DC where several factions like supermutants, raiders, vault dwellers, brotherhood of steal etc. live in uneasy coexistence. It possible to play this game strictly by following the plot, but the main plot is somewhat short and strictly speaking there are better plot-driven games. The real fun of Fallout is open-ended exploration. The game world is huge and has more than enough stuff to do, Although the game is very dark, everything is done tongue in cheek. This includes many subplots (e.g. Wasteland survival guide missions intended as tutorial are often outright hilarious), character development system and violence which is so excessive it becomes ridiculous (in a good way). The games also offers tons of different weapons and skills. Main problem with this game is the low-level cap of 20, which is reached very early in the game (especially if you like exploration). Broken Steel DLC increases this to 30, which is still low but alleviates the problem to some extent. To sum it up, Fallout 3 is definitely worth buying if you like exploration, RPG, excessive violence and silly dark humor. It offers tons of playtime and good value for your money.

Again, the user score is more than unfair. Mass Effect 3 is a good game, but it just doesn't live up to the expectations people had after the second part. The main problem with Mass Effect 3 is the storytelling which builds up to whole lot of nothing. And with this, I don't mean just the ending which is unsatisfying to say the least. The whole coming back to Earth part seams rushed after spending the whole game preparing for it. Also one of the main elements of the game, collecting war resources, seems to affect nothing in the end (maybe some cinematic is slightly altered). Overall gaming experience is also not quite as immersive as with Mass Effect 2. On several occasions, I couldn't help the feeling that I was just running around completing some random tasks to get to the next place. Also NPC characters didn't feel quite as deep as in Mass Effect 2. However, compared to storytelling these are very minor issues and the overall gaming experience was still very good. It's hard to say if this game can be recommended or not. Basically everything, except the storytelling, is done as it should or better. However, one of the worst things game can do is leave players unsatisfied at the end. Thus I wouldn't at least wait some kind of bargain before considering buying this.

Basically Alan Wake's American Nightmare is the same Alan Wake game all over again. Only with weaker storytelling and weaker character design. The plot is again the same Stephen King stuff as with the original. This might be good or bad thing depending on your preferences. Personally I dislike far out horror stuff that doesn't connect with reality in any way. It's just random stuff that happens, which makes me loose interest. To sum up, I found this game quite boring and didn't bother to play it through. Maybe some day, if I have nothing better to do, I'll look it again. Unless you really liked the original Alan Wake or you're a horror buff, I wouldn't recommend buying this.

Alan Wake is a solid game featuring some innovative gaming elements and gorgeous graphics. It's very atmospheric even scary at times and there are some good moments in it. Character design is also superb. The main issue I have with this game is the plot which is too far "out there" for me. Thus the experience wasn't as immersive it could have been with a plot that can be taken seriously. The story has obvious similarities with Stephen King books so if you like King (I don't), you probably don't have this problem. Alan Wake features around 15 hours of playtime. Since it's very story driven game, it has little replay value. Thus I wouldn't pay too much for this game.

Probably the best Civilization game thus far especially for anyone looking just fun strategy gaming. The game looks gorgeous and features some new features like hex-tiles and social policies (get to select civilization bonuses when culture grows enough). Can't say if this is the best CIV game (or not) for all you hardcore strategy nuts since I'm not that hardcore myself. I do think that the current user score (7.2) is unfair. If this was was non-civilization game, the score would easily be around 8 or 9.

Torchlight is simple, fresh and fun RPG. Many of its elements resemble earlier Diable games. Storytelling is a bit lacking and the game can become repetitive towards the end. If you're looking simple and fun game to play for weekend or two, this is worth buying.

Great game that offers very immersive gaming experience. Has great story, good dialog and athmospheric soundtrack. What comes to your play style, character interactions and character development, Deus Ex offers lots of freedom to do things your way. Also the game world goes beyond simple good vs. evil setup, and many decisions you have to make, don't have clear right answers. This goes also to NPC characters who often have complex motives. Main weak point of this game are boss battles Especially if you are playing stealth character, these battles can be purely annoying. Graphics are a bit outdated, but this didn't really bother me. Ending was a bit letdown, but served its purpose. Deus Ex features about 30 hours of playtime (can vary hugely depending your play style and amount of side quests you do) and good replay value. It's a good buy and offers lots for your money.

Without a doubt XCOM: Enemy Unknown is one of the better games that have come out recently. It manages to create very athmospheric gaming experience. Especially during first play through, I was genuinely scared since I didn't know what to expect. One of the key aspects of the game is managing your base and soldiers, which is lots of fun. Soldiers are very customizable and gain experience from missions so you can level them up. You get attached to them and it can be upsetting when you loose them in battle. The game very is streamlined and everything works intuitively. Item management is a bit cumbersome, but otherwise I had no issues with gaming interface. The alien design (although a bit cartoony) is also great. Almost all aliens can be devastating in their own way and you can rarely take any enemy troops lightly. Some aliens like cryssalids, berserkers and PSI-using aliens force you act quickly and can really bring panicky feeling to missions. After few missions, your really start to fear them. Main weak point of this game are special missions and maps that quickly become repetitive. Also the plot is rather irrelevant after one play through. Still the game has good replay value and gives lots of playtime compared many other titles. NOTE: I haven't played the original XCOM games (altough I've seen gameplay video etc.) so I reviewed this title as independent game.

Bioshock Infinite has lots of things going for it. The game looks beautiful and manages to create atmospheric and immersive gaming experience. Elizabeth is also one of the best game characters I can remember. Also Elizabeth's role as support character during battles works well. The biggest problem with this game is the storytelling which is a bit messy and not always paced well. It can at times be difficult to keep track at the 'bigger plot' of the game. The ending is also somewhat confusing and doesn't spell every detail out if you didn't pick things up by yourself during the game. It's also likely to leave players expecting typical happy ending unsatisfied. The gaming system itself has some minor problems. The game offers lots of different weapons and skills from which many are similar and thus somewhat redundant. Most players probably end up using only small portion of these. Equipment system is very underdeveloped and the game has very few wearable items. Same goes to code books. Also Vigor upgrades are unproportionally expensive. All in all, Bioshock Infinite is a good game. It's disappointing in the sense that it could have been great game with more fluent storytelling. The game is also rather short offering only about 10 hours of playtime. If you're on budget, you might want to buy something that offers more bang for your hard-earned bug.