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A solid 7/10. Expectations were sky high that this would match CDPR's Witcher 3, but this game doesn't quite reach those levels. The table top game's lore, look, and feel are faithfully reproduced with this game, and it's one of the best looking titles to date on PC. Night City is one of the best looking futuristic cities created for a game, though it's not as interactive as it should be. The gameplay is comparable to Fallout 4 or Eidos' Deus Ex series, in that it's a first person shooter with RPG elements plus some looter elements of Borderlands. Customization and gampelay aren't as deep as Deus Ex though, and the action oriented gampelay route is often the one that's most rewarded. The story and characters are interesting and serviceable, but aren't as compelling as CDBR's Witcher 3. There are quite a few bugs at launch, with fairly frequent texture pop-ins, missing collisions, glitchy NPCs, and key binds that need to be manually changed in the config file. The game also requires quite a beefy rig o play.

Destiny-style sci-fi RPG looter featuring mechs, from the makers of Mass Effect. The gameplay is solid. Traversing around the world is a lot of fun, and the weapons feel good. There's a lack of mission variety though. The combat also becomes a bit one-note after awhile and doesn't take advantage of the game's traversal mechanics. There's also the usual customization and character leveling options that you'd expect from a game like this. The graphics and overall presentation are top notch, though there are a lot of loading screens. The lore, setting and story are interesting. Not as deep as Mass Effect, but still good. I would have preferred the story be presented more in the missions rather than in the readable collectibles though. The load times are pretty bad at launch, and there are some visual/audio bugs. The game is also lacking content at the moment. Overall a very promising start. Hopefully EA continues to support this franchise.

Uncharted 4 is Naughty Dog's latest Uncharted game, and features Naughty Dog's trademark high production values applied to an Indiana Jones style action-adventure game. Art, sound, animations, and cutscenes are excellent all around. The cast deliver superb voice and mocap performances. The story involves Nathan Drake going on one more adventure to look for pirate treasure, in an effort to save his older brother Sam. Typical Uncharted fare, though the addition of Nate's brother and the exploration of Nate's relationship with his wife Elena helped bring some depth to a main character that's always been fairly generic. The antagonists this time around were not as compelling as previous games. The character Nadine in particular felt like a "badass chick" trope that was thrown in to appease the feminists. The game itself was too long, and could have been 14 chapter game instead of 20. There were some overly long walk and talk sections, and many of the platforming sections started to repeat themselves. The gameplay remains a mix of combat with platforming and some puzzle solving. There are also some new Tomb Raider style mechanics in the pickaxe and the grapple rope. The platforming and puzzles are the series biggest strengths, and they are showcased well in this game. Now on to the big bad of the game, and indeed the series in general: the combat. It's awful. All the worst aspects of the combat in 2 and 3 have been retained and amplified. First of all, the aiming. The camera controls have this weird acceleration lag that makes trying to aim at enemies a chore. This is exacerbated by the aim-down-sights sensitivity, which is way too high, even on a setting of 0. If you do manage to get your reticule on an enemy, they go into a little dodge animation that moves them to the left or to the right. If wrestling with the camera controls wasn't enough, they have to throw an extra curveball with this ridiculous dodge animation that requires you to adjust your aim a second time. When you do hit them, they play an exaggerated stagger animation that once again throws off your aim. The overall effect of all these compounding issues is a gunplay experience that is frustrating and not fun. Playing on anything above normal turns enemies into sniping machines. They know exactly where you are at all times, even after you've broken line of sight with them. And the grenade spam... there hasn't been this much grenade spam since Call of Duty: World at War. Enemies are able to throw grenades with pinpoint accuracy, and at distances that exceed what is allowed for the player. Taking cover and dodge are bound to the same button. The game will often do one instead of the other, leading to many unintended deaths in gunfights. Your NPC teammates are useless. They frequently use up the best cover available. If you do share cover with them, they will push you out into the open or obscure your aim. The only thing they're good for is occasionally picking off an already weakened enemy. So there it is, Uncharted 4. 6/10. A solid entry in the series with high production values and an enjoyable story, dragged down by it's gameplay ambitions and terrible combat.

The definitive edition is unplayable. Key binds cannot be changed, and you're stuck with whatever the defaults are. If you have a multiple monitor setup, the mouse is not locked, and will exit out of the game if you click away from the main screen. The graphics have been enhanced, but it's not worth it when you can't even play the game comfortably. The original game was ported rather poorly, and this definitive edition is another slap in the face. Shame on Microsoft for releasing it in this state.

This is how lazy Bethesda was with this remaster: There's a mod called the "Unofficial Skyrim Special Edition Patch" which fixes bugs in the remaster. Keep in mind, these exact same bugs existed in the original Skyrim. Bethesda didn't even bother fixing them for the remaster. Apart from the usual graphical bells and whistles, this is the exact same thing as the original Skyrim. 4 for laziness.

A charming game with lots of personality. If you liked games like Remember Me or Mirror's Edge, then you'll like this one. Interesting story and alien world setting. The gameplay is a mix of third person shooter with some light open-world exploration and RPG leveling and crafting. The movement system features jet boots, which allows for interesting movement and traversal. Overall I found the gameplay to be OK, but it gets a bit repetitive with the limited attack options. The PC version of the game is functional but is clearly a console port. There's almost no graphical options and there are some bugs with binding actions to certain keys. The game is also only available on the Windows 10 store.

When I heard they were re-releasing this, I thought it would be a straight up remaster; upres the original graphics, improve the sound quality, squash a few bugs, etc. Instead they straight up remade the whole game. I'm not sure this was such a good idea. The original was VERY unique, created by a group of master artists and programmers at the now defunct Sierra. Pinkerton Road are quite frankly not up to the challenge. Yes, they may have more cutting edge tools at their disposal, but it's like telling a high school art student to recreate the Mona Lisa. Some of the "improvements", such as streamlining down the UI, feel like concessions made for the casual crowd. Go back and play the original if you want the true authentic experience.

Metro: Last Light is a post-apocalyptic FPS set in the ruins of Moscow's subway tunnels. You play as the survivor Artyom, and must battle radiation, mutated creatures, and warring human factions as you unravel the mystery of the Dark Ones. The game is a mix of traditional FPS mixed with stealth, horror, and survival. The levels are mostly linear with some more open areas. Some levels can be entirely stealthed through, it's up to you. Overall, there's a good mix of action and slower sections, and the story is engaging and keeps you playing. If you have a good enough rig, this game looks great. On to the complaints. It's rough around the edges presentation-wise. The graphics are mostly good, but the environment textures and model quality can vary wildly, and a lot of the character models look blobby and are badly animated. The UI is also clunky and feels like it was ported over from consoles. In Ranger Hardcore mode, which removes all of the HUD, there is no way to really know how much ammo you have left, or what throwable you have equipped. Despite these shortcomings, this is a solid game. The gameplay, story, and setting are enough to make this a recommended play.

Let's not pretend this is an innovative and groundbreaking game, because its not. TLOU is your basic Walking Dead episode made into a game. You got your clickers (zombies), post-apocalyptic America, the last remnants of humanity fighting for survival, and all the "tough" and "gut wrenching" situations and story beats that you'd expect from this genre. You play generic gruff white guy Joel, and the intolerably precocious Ellie. ND claims that wanted to break molds with the characters, but at the end of the day, you're playing yet another white guy, protecting a damsel in distress. The gameplay: it ****. This is not a fun game. Very clumsy 3rd person shooter with lots of realism mechanics thrown in, like staggering when you get hit, limited ammo, and spastic enemy animations that make it hard to hit them. There's some lazy stealth thrown in, which consists of you shuffling around cover and being told you are hidden, even though the top of your head is clearly visible to the AI. There's some crafting and a small skill tree thrown into the mix, but they don't add much. Other games have done it before, and in a more fun way. This game was one huge chunk of Oscar-bait. Everything about it screams "look at us, we're so thought provoking and serious". It feels forced and unnatural, like they want their game to be considered art. Along the way, they forgot that they were making a game, which is supposed to be fun. As such, as a game, TLOU is a complete failure.

Campaign is a joke. But we don't play BF for the campaign so I'll skip to the multiplayer. This is an inherently good squad FPS game, probably the best of it's kind. Solid shooting mechanics and a very robust leveling system. It is let down by bad map design, too few infantry-based maps, and a terrible web browser based matchmaking system. 6/10.

At level 16 and 8 hours in, I've already hit half of all the possible unlocks. I've played all the modes, and only 2 are any good. There are 4 maps, reused over and over again in the different modes. The gameplay is terrible and lacks any of the depth we've come to know from the Battlefield series. Many of the maps are severely unbalanced, favoring either the Rebels or the Empire. There are lots of gimmicky insta-kill weapons like the AT-AT and the Bowcaster. Everyone gets infinite grenades. Some of the higher level weapons are massively overpowered, and as such are abused by the high level players. Spawns are a mess. You can get killed by a hero, spawn right next to him and get killed again. There are pickups for various items like gun turrets, though whether you get them or not depends on whether you can beat your own teammates to them. Because there are no player classes, it is very hard to control the battlefield using teamwork. Every game ends up feeling like a huge free-for-all, with random deaths coming from every direction, regardless of how skilled you are as a player. Needless to say, this makes the game very frustrating. It's only the Star Wars universe that keeps me engaged at the moment, and I think that will be running out very soon.

Yes, this is still the Fallout that we know and love. The post-apocalyptic setting. The lore. The mutated creatures. Wandering around, seeing something cool in the distance, going there, killing all the bad guys, grabbing the loot, seeing something else in the distance, going there, repeat. It's all back in Fallout 4. That being said though, they have taken quite a few steps back with this game. Yes, the RPG system has been simplified. There are no skills anymore, weapon and armor don't degrade, there is no karma system, and the perks system has been reworked. The skills and reworked perks system, I can live with. The other two, not so much. I imagine they did it to streamline the series and appeal to a wider audience. The lack of a karma system means that the only meaningful choices you get to make are what factions to join, which leaves little room for any real role-playing. The story and setting this time around also don't have the appeal of Fallout 3. With a few exceptions, characters are flat and uninteresting, and this isn't helped by the lack of interesting player dialogue choices. Boston also doesn't have the uniqueness that Washington DC had. The usual Bethesda bugs are still in abundance. NPC followers can get **** on objects, static cars can unexpectedly go flying and crush you, bad VATS cameras will glitch through enemies, and so on. The UI is also a bit of a mess. The pipboy menus in general are cluttered and confusing, and certain key binds are hard bound to actions. You can also build settlements now. It's a cool idea, but poorly explained and implemented. 30 hours in, I still don't know what ultimate purpose they serve or how it benefits me. Onto the positives. The world looks great. The art style in general is more colorful and vibrant than Fallout 3's, helped by a much improved graphics engine. Art quality is hit or miss though. Some areas look great while others look laughably bad. Character models and animations have been improved. 3rd person view in particular feels much better because of this. Character creation is also very robust, with tons of face customization options. The gun gameplay and general player navigation is also improved, and feels more in line with what you'd expect from a modern FPS. It can still be quite janky, especially when jumping or trying to navigate rocky terrain. You can also craft weapons and armor now, which is great. That also means every little clutter item in the world should be picked up, as they are used for crafting. So in conclusion, if you loved Fallout 3 for it's setting and and exploration gameplay, Fallout 4 will give you more of that but with a bit of next-gen polish. If you wanted a deep RPG experience, then the streamlining that Bethesda has done may disappoint you. Though not the classic that it's predecessor was, Fallout 4 is still a good game and a worthy addition to the Fallout series.

Yes, this is still the Fallout that we know and love. The post-apocalyptic setting. The lore. The mutated creatures. Wandering around, seeing something cool in the distance, going there, killing all the bad guys, grabbing the loot, seeing something else in the distance, going there, repeat. It's all back in Fallout 4. That being said though, they have taken quite a few steps back with this game. Yes, the RPG system has been simplified. There are no skills anymore, weapon and armor don't degrade, there is no karma system, and the perks system has been reworked. The skills and reworked perks system, I can live with. The other two, not so much. I imagine they did it to streamline the series and appeal to a wider audience. The lack of a karma system means that the only meaningful choices you get to make are what factions to join, which leaves little room for any real role-playing. The story and setting this time around also don't have the appeal of Fallout 3. With a few exceptions, characters are flat and uninteresting, and this isn't helped by the lack of interesting player dialogue choices. Boston also doesn't have the uniqueness that Washington DC had. The usual Bethesda bugs are still in abundance. NPC followers can get **** on objects, static cars can unexpectedly go flying and crush you, bad VATS cameras will glitch through enemies, and so on. The UI is also a bit of a mess. The pipboy menus in general are cluttered and confusing, and certain key binds are hard bound to actions. You can also build settlements now. It's a cool idea, but poorly explained and implemented. 30 hours in, I still don't know what ultimate purpose they serve or how it benefits me. Onto the positives. The world looks great. The art style in general is more colorful and vibrant than Fallout 3's, helped by a much improved graphics engine. Art quality is hit or miss though. Some areas look great while others look laughably bad. Character models and animations have been improved. 3rd person view in particular feels much better because of this. Character creation is also very robust, with tons of face customization options. The gun gameplay and general player navigation is also improved, and feels more in line with what you'd expect from a modern FPS. It can still be quite janky, especially when jumping or trying to navigate rocky terrain. You can also craft weapons and armor now, which is great. That also means every little clutter item in the world should be picked up, as they are used for crafting. So in conclusion, if you loved Fallout 3 for it's setting and and exploration gameplay, Fallout 4 will give you more of that but with a bit of next-gen polish. If you wanted a deep RPG experience, then the streamlining that Bethesda has done may disappoint you. Though not the classic that it's predecessor was, Fallout 4 is still a good game and a worthy addition to the Fallout series.

The gameplay, which was paper thin to begin with, has been watered down even more in Season 2. There is barely anything for you to do as a player. By the time you hit episode 3, it feels like you're watching a movie instead of playing a game. The QTEs in particular have become very contrived, and at times, downright aggravating. The story and characters are a step down from the excellence of season 1. There are still some interesting situations and dialogues, but be prepared to wade through some very mediocre gameplay to get to them. Dialogue cutscenes and end credits are still unskippable, and the game still saves at arbitrary points, forcing you to replay whole sections over again if you quit before these saves trigger. Overall, not as good as season 1. This whole series hinges on strong story and characters, and without them, this season falters.

Hands down, the most overrated game of 2013. To all the high scorers, did you have any FUN with this game? Really. Because I didn't. This game was an absolute chore to play through. The only thing that kept me going was the fairly interesting story, and the high production values. This is a Naughty Dog game, so you can expect superb graphics, animations, voice acting, and cutscenes. However the gameplay is a mess. This is a 3rd person shooter with some tacked on stealth. However ammo is scarce, so most of the time it is better to go the stealth route. The controls however feel loose (read: realism), and require you to have better aim than your standard third person shooter. NPC enemies also have very spastic animations, so even when you think you have a shot on them, they will jerk their body or head to the side and you will miss the shot. You go into an annoying stagger animation when you get shot (again, realism), which requires you to re-aim your shot, by which time the enemy has already closed the distance and is pounding you to shreds. Close quarters combat is stacked towards the enemy, especially the zombies, many of whom can one-shot kill you at this range. Ellie, your NPC companion, aids very little in combat. Enemies are also oblivious to her presence, even though it is clear they can see her. I guess the idea here was not to punish the player for enemies spotting your NPC companion, but this simply breaks immersion. You also can't switch weapons while on the move, which is especially aggravating when you need to switch from an empty to a loaded weapon while an enemy is chasing you. The game itself plays like your typical cinematic linear shooter, with some outdoor areas that open up a bit and allowing you to explore. All your standard shooter gameplay tropes are here: "defend an area from hordes of enemies", "find an alternate route", "clear area of enemies to proceed", "run away from an armored vehicle"... you get the idea. There are some tiresome ladder and plank "puzzles" that require you to move a ladder from A to B to get somewhere. They add nothing to the gameplay and feel like padding. There is also a skill system (what game doesn't have this nowadays?) that allows you to upgrade your character. It's good to have, and allows you to tailor your gameplay experience somewhat, although I found many of the skills to be useless (faster crafting? what's the point? You shouldn't be crafting during combat). The story is serviceable. You play as Joel, a grieving father tasked with delivering Ellie, a girl immune to the zombie virus, to the human resistance movement. It's like the Walking Dead; the last vestiges of humanity fighting against zombies, lots of interpersonal relationship stuff, harrowing situations, etc. Which is fine, not a lot of games go this route. But TLOU didn't invent this genre, so let's not give it more credit than it deserves. Joel is your typical gruff white guy we've seen dozens of times by now. As for Ellie, they seemed to have cast someone too old to play her, as she comes off as being a little too precocious. The section where you play as Ellie. She says "piece of ****" or "motherf*cker" EVERY TIME she kills someone. Why was this necessary? It's not behavior you'd expect from a pre-teen. The much talked about ending, though clever emotionally, left an empty feeling with me, similar to Prince of Persia 2008's ending. As a player, I want to feel like I accomplished something. Don't throw away everything I've done in the past 10+ hours. To sum up, this is not a fun game. If you want to play a Walking Dead episode, with all of Naughty Dog's trademark high production values, then this is for you. However if like me, you like your games to be fun, then give this a pass.

Bethesda stretched themselves too thin with this game, and the result is a game that lacks any depth and is instead is crammed with repetitive and trivial content. Unlike the excellent Fallout 3, there are no significant choices to be made in any of the quests you will undertake. Solutions to most everything will be to kill, and kill some more. There is so much exposition thrown at you that you will start to lose track of what's going on, and without any truly memorable set piece type quests to back them up, they remain nothing more than exposition. The world, though undeniably large, starts to blend together into an indistinguishable mish-mash of dungeons, forests, and towns. There are hundreds of NPCs, but just like the locations and quests, they are too many and too shallow. There are no branching dialogue trees; most characters will have 3 or 4 topics of conversation. Worst of all is hearing the same 10 or so voice actors spread across the hundreds of NPCs. The art is a mixed bag. The color palette is grey and drab, suitable for the Nordic environment, but it becomes an eyesore over time. There are some great looking environments, such as the dense forests and mountain vistas, however many areas look like they were hurriedly built, such as the northern coastline. The characters look as stiff as ever; both in their procedurally generated faces and their terrible animations... both Bethesda trademark. The music is uniformly excellent, though it can get repetitive hearing the same battle and town themes over and over. Don't get me wrong, there is fun to be had. Play the main quest line and a few of the faction quest lines, and you will get the best of what Skyrim has to offer. Delve any deeper and you will ultimately find a shallow experience devoid of any meaning.

The difficult "second album" of a series can be hit or miss, but this one manages to hit on almost all counts. This is a superior game to it's predecessor in every way possible. The most significant improvement is that they gave Isaac a voice. No longer is he the mute protagonist running to and fro playing errand boy for other people; this time he is a living human being, driven by his own personal objectives. This parlays into much more interesting and meaningful missions, as there is now a personal impetus to get through the story. The story and universe are also expanded upon from the first, with lots of interesting backstory delivered in the form of interesting text and audio logs. The gameplay also feels tighter and more polished than the first. Isaac feels more nible and responsive than his past self, which makes for more fluid gameplay. Combat is as frantic as ever, and harder difficulties really challenge the player to use ammo smartly and have good situational awareness. The more action-y gameplay however, has meant alot of the slower paced horror and creepiness of the first game have been left by the wayside. Enemies also seem to have been recycled from the first, and there aren't many unique monsters. Gameplay could have also been spruced up a bit with some new features. As it is, it's the gameplay of old, but much more polished. There are alot of standout "set piece" sequences, similar to the Uncharted series. One involving a monster chasing Isaac, with the camera peering over Isaac's front, is an ingeniously crafted action sequence. The graphics, audio, and artwork are also well executed. There is an incredible sense of time and place. You really believe this far-future sci fi world exists, even though it doesn't. All in all, a great sequel, pick it up.

As enamored as people are with the characters and the story of this series, they continually overlook one thing: there is NOT ENOUGH GAMEPLAY. It can barely be called as a game, more an interactive motion comic. As stellar as the storytelling is, it is dragged down by poor gameplay, which at it's worse becomes a series of quick time events. You will be spending 75% of your time watching cutscenes. If that's your thing, then more power to you. Me, I'd rather be playing a game. The choices you make don't seem to meaningfully impact the story either. It will still continue down the same linear storyline no matter what choice you make, albeit with some minor tonal changes. Other aspects are lackluster as well; you can tell the team was working on a budget, as a lot of the animations and artwork aren't as polished as they could be. So on those merits, I give this a solid 7. A good outing by Telltale, but there is a lot of room for improvement. I think people have been so starved of good storytelling in games recently, that they jumped all over this and proclaimed it GOTY. Once the dust settles I think we will be able to view what this is with more objective eyes.

PROS: - Good graphics in general. Old armor and weapon designs have been revamped, some nice environment set pieces. - The Halo gameplay we know and love is back, with a few tweaks here and there. - Multiplayer is fun, with some nice updates to familiar modes. - Good sound effects. - Some very impressive cutscenes. CONS: -The gameplay is Halo by the numbers. Not much in the way of innovation or brand new features, just the same old package wrapped in a shinier skin. - Bland missions, mostly consisting of Chief running back and forth doing various menial tasks. Not much in the way of pacing. - Art direction is typical sci-fi flair, nothing we haven't seen before. The forerunner planet didn't strike any awe or sense of exploration in me, which was disappointing. - There is alot of unexplained backstory. The game throws you right into it. Which is fine for Halo diehards, but completely unforgiving to newcomers. - There's an admirable attempt to humanize Master Chief and make him a more serious character. Nice try, but the character is little more than a walking tank that shoots aliens. Always has been, always will be. They pretty much wrote him into a corner by throwing a helmet over his face. - The character of Cortana annoys me to no end. The generic "sexy" voice that grated on me in the previous games is now front and center. She simply won't shut up. If you're going to use her so prominently, ditch this voice actress and hire someone whose voice has a little more character and imperfection. - Forgettable musical score. It's amazing how much O'Donnell's work added to the old games, and his presence is sorely missed here. SUMMARY: A by the books Halo wrapped in a shinier package. This series is in dire need of evolution or it will become another Call of Duty.

PROS = Art style is nice. Environments are colorful and varied. Simple to-the-point gameplay. Visual and audio FX are nice. Skill and rune system works for the most part. Good for RPG newcomers who want to jump in and kill things quickly. CONS = Repetitive gameplay. It becomes a grind for better gear after the first playthrough. If you find this fun, then knock yourself out. Always on-line requirement. There is no justification for this in a largely single player game. Even with a kickass machine and good internet connection, you are at the complete mercy of Blizzard's servers. Lag spikes. Get used to the sight of your character running around with everything else on the screen frozen, then suddenly dying. The story is abyssmal. Characters are two dimensional, no sense of pacing, predictable plot twists, and lack of any emotional undercurrent. In-game cutscenes are cartoonish and fail to convey any gravitas. Forgettable music and sound. Your character screaming "I require aid", "not enough discipline" and other such nonsense becomes aggravating, especially at higher levels. Lack of character customization. Skills/rune system is extremely limited and funnel you into a few builds per class. Many of the skills are useless. VERDICT = I was on stage 3 of the Diablo boss fight on Hell, doing very well after 12 attempts, and got a server disconnect. I uninstalled the game 15 minutes ago and am officially done. The always-online requirement destroys the core functionality of the game. Losing all your map progress due to server connection problems is UNACCEPTABLE. Again, there is NO REASON for a single player game to have an always-online requirement. If you wanted to hop into a co-op game or do online trading, fine, connect to the servers at that time. But if you're soloing by yourself, there is absolutely no reason. This, and the realization that the game is nothing more than a grind for more powerful (and ultimately meaningless) gear, has led me to quit. There are better and more meaningful games to waste your time on.