malcolmm

I’ve played SFCoE for well over 100 hours and have won the game with all heroes on normal difficulty, including the first DLC (waiting for the second DLC). The game is great. The few negative reviews are from people who didn’t bother to do any research into the game before buying it. This game is not a HoMM style game, although if you like that series you will probably still like SFCoE. The developers have introduced some RPG elements into HoMM turned based gameplay. The map is massive with dozens of interesting quests. The different heroes are very unusual, not just a few different stats. Each hero plays completely differently and introduces new game play elements. The variety of enemy unit and battlefields is great. The second, just released DLC adds random maps and many other new features. Overall this game is a classic. It has that “just one more turn” game play.

A reasonably fun arcade strategy game which is ruined by terrible difficulty balancing. I completed almost all the battles in the first two chapters with perfect. This is despite the poor design decision of not telling you how many turns you have for perfect. Still, this part of the game is fun and I also enjoyed completing the challenges before moving on to the third chapter. This is where the difficulty balancing issues destroyed my enjoyment of the game. The difficulty ramps up greatly, which is bad enough. Worse, there is little strategy and a lot of luck in the battles. Enemy units suddenly appear and get a turn before you can react to them. This is incredibly poor game design. I would rate the second half of the game as 0 out of 10 but overall give the game a 5.

So much hype for this game but it doesn’t deserve it. Sure there is a lot of content but the quality is poor. Same old problems with camera controls that have always been an issue with 3D Mario games. No imagination displayed in the level design, recycling world themes as always.

Initially I didn’t enjoy playing MT as much as I expected. I think that was mostly because the game doesn’t have a tutorial and there are a lot of new, to me, game concepts to learn. But that ends up being a plus, I’m tired of StS clones and MT definitely isn’t a clone. Lots of variety and tons of play value. The support from the devs is great, they bring out free enhancements that would be paid dlc in most games. For me this game has been significantly more enjoyable to play than StS. StS was very good but MT is better.

Meteorfall is my current favourite card battler, which is saying something as I play a lot of them. Everything is great - charming graphics, slick interface and it’s easy to learn. Easy to learn doesn’t mean easy to master. There are five heroes and they each play very differently. Don’t be fooled if you breeze through with the first hero, lots of challenge awaits. I’ve got over 30 hours in the game and have won on normal difficulty with all the heroes. I still play some of the daily challenges. For those who dislike excessive randomness in their card battlers, that isn’t an issue here. Before you start a battle you will know how things will go, the game is mostly deterministic. The game plays like no other card battler I’ve played, which is good. Much as I like Slay the Spire, I don’t want to play another clone and this game definitely isn’t a clone. I’ve also been playing Monster Train, a much more well known card battler. While I enjoy Monster Train I prefer Meteorfall.

This game is close to being a classic but in the end, for a casual gamer like myself, it completely misses the mark and ends up being extremely frustrating. Most of the game is a reasonable challenge on normal difficulty. I then got to the ginso tree. This changed my opinion about the game completely, I started to hate the game. It isn't as if the developers didn't know players get frustrated with this level, there are lots of threads on how annoying and unfair it is. Even on easy it is incredibly annoying. So if you are a casual gamer, skip the frustration and play and game from a developer who actually cares.

So many issues with this game, I'm glad I only paid $12 for it from Humble Bundle. As usual for a AAA title the "professional" reviews rate the game much higher than the general public. First off, the tutorial is terrible, pretty much completely useless. It hardly merits being called a tutorial, it is just a short mission with a few prompts. It misses many important parts of the mission interface. As for the rest of the game, good luck, no tutorial for what to do back at the base. I did play the previous XCOM but that was years ago, I've forgotten pretty much everything about the game. There is a manual but it is useless, it just repeats what the equally useless tutorial tells you. Most of the game consists of video sequences, it is obvious where most of the budget went. The missions themselves are extremely simple yet very frustrating. Still the same over emphasis on luck. Making most of the missions timed was a huge mistake, you mostly have to rush the target with little time for tactics. I normally don't buy AAA titles, mostly boring graphics showcases. XCOM2 is a prime example of this, all flash but no substance. Microprose did it so much better, Firaxis has managed to ruin both XCOM and Civilization.

Everything about this game is horrible, I have no idea why the reviews are so positive. Of course the graphics are terrible, but I expected that from the screenshots. The biggest negative is the simplistic gameplay. All you do is talk to everyone and get assigned mind numbingly boring fetch quests. This is the sort of nonsense I use to play back in the 8 bit computer days. It was boring then and it is boring now. There are so many better games out there, in fact there aren't that many that are worse than this one.

I really enjoy arcade puzzle platformers such as Toki Tori so I should really like Blackhole. But I don't, I really dislike it. Controls are fiddly. The game is to reliant on precise jumps. The controls aren't very good. I don't mind sometimes having to restart a level I know how to solve because I missed a jump but this happens far to often in this game.

The basic gameplay is solid and enjoyable in adventure (campaign) mode. But the developers completely spoiled the game by including horrible boss battles. Surely some of the worst boss battles ever designed. One mistake and your done, restart the battle for another 10 minutes of frustration and boredom. There aren't many different things you do in the boss battles so the lazy developers have you repeat the same actions literally dozens of times.

I can't recall assigning a game such a low score before. I usually ignore the really low scores because usually the reviewer didn't like one aspect of the game (e.g. no redefinable keys) and gave the game a 0. Because the reviews of this game are very positive I gave this game more time than I think it deserves. I still doesn't deserve a score of 0, it did run and I didn't find any bugs but that is all I can say that is positive about it. I tried to like it. I ignored the graphics, which are so bad they hinder gameplay. I don't mind the lack of voice acting. Not having played the first season the story didn't make much sense - more bizarre than interesting. What is left - the puzzles. There aren't many puzzles and when I got stuck it was because I hadn't done enough blob hunting (low resolution version of pixel hunting) or I didn't walk on the correct section of the floor.

No matter how much I dislike a game I rarely rate is less than 5. I figure that even if I don't like the game, if it is competently designed other people may like it. Satellite Reign is so bad it deserves less than 5. Unbelievably bad game. I played and completed Syndicate ages ago when it was first released. Hard to believe that with modern hardware they can release a game that is much worse than the original. I got a bad feeling when I first launched the game and it took forever to load. This is the slowest launching game I've played in many years. It goes downhill from there. The tutorial is next to useless. There is no manual and I disliked the game so much I wasn't willing to put the time into figuring out the details of how to play the game.

This is a really good game for people who are good at this type of game. Unfortunately I'm not one of those people. I really enjoy playing the game but I'm not good enough to get futher than the first three levels/worlds. I hit a wall at this point and realized I wasn't going to get any further. Perhaps if I read every hint guide and video I could go a bit further (no way could I complete it) but I'm not interested in doing that. I'm not afraid to admit that I'm a casual gamer. I guess I shouldn't have bought the game. However, I was informed that the game has difficulty levels. Unfortunately it doesn't have what I would call true difficulty levels - everyone plays the same game and if you beat the game at that difficulty level you can play it at a harder difficulty. 0 Comments Subsc

Not the worst adventure game I've ever played but far from the best. Act one is pretty good - the story is interesting. Now many puzzles in Act one but at least almost all of them are logical. Act two kills the game. The same locations are reused and there is lots of running around trying to find the person who will advance the puzzles you are working on. The puzzles are more challenging but only because the solutions border on the absurd. Technically the game is quite good - the graphics are nice and the voice acting is of a high quality. But story and puzzles count the most for me so I can't recommend this game.

A great adventure game in the style of the first two Monkey Island games. The graphics and voice acting are great. Puzzles are very logical, maybe a bit on the easy side but I prefer that to having illogical puzzles I have to consult a walkthrough to get past. I'm giving it a 9 instead of a 10 because I encountered one puzzle that didn't work properly with my computer, but I seem to be the only person who has encountered the problem. The story is interesting and the humor is great.

What a wonderful adventure game. I've been a little disappointed with some recent adventure games, including most of the recent games from Daedalic. Anna's Quest reminds me of why I enjoy adventure games so much. Everything about it is great - a very interesting, unusual story. Excellent graphics and voice acting. Where adventure games often fail for me is with the puzzles. Either they are too easy or they are tough but nonsensical. Fortunately, Anna's Quest also gets the puzzles right. The first chapter was a bit easy and I thought the puzzles would be too easy. But they gradually got tougher, but they always remained fair. I can't think of a puzzle that was unfair.

Not the worst adventure game ever, but certainly one of the most over rated. Nothing stands out - the graphics are average, the interface is clumsy and none of the characters are voiced. Puzzles are okay, except for a bugged puzzle that caused me to give up on the game. I completed all the steps required to solve a puzzle (I know this because there is a "recipe" for the required items), put the items where they are suppose to go, but the game said I was missing an item. Which leads to another huge drawback to this buggy game, no saved games. The game auto saves, so I was stuck. I could go back to the start of the chapter, but I might encounter the same bug. Play the very similar, but much better Anna's Quest instead.

This game was a very pleasant surprise to me. I got it in a bundle and it wasn't the game I bought the bundle for. I like arcade puzzle games so I decided to give the game a chance. I'm glad I did, it's one of my favorite puzzle games, and I've played a lot of them. Lots of levels to play, about 100 in the main game plus a bonus world. I've played the game for about a dozen hours and I still have some levels left to complete. The puzzles are all fair and well balanced. The early levels are easy as they should be, but the game becomes challenging soon enough. You are scored on how many stars you get, how many boxes you burn and the time you take. You can always take a long as you want and you don't have to get all the stars or burn all of the boxes (except on the boss levels). This is an excellent idea, it still takes some good puzzle solving to complete a level but if you want a tough challenge go for 100% stars and burning boxes with a good time. There is a leaderboard for each level. I would recommend this game at full price. I hope the developer comes out with another similar game, I will be happy to buy it on release day if they do.

It took me a while to appreciate AoW3, it can be a bit rough to get started in it. I'm a veteran of turn based strategy games so I usually don't have any problem learning the rules. However, some concepts in AoW3 I a bit unusual (which is good) but it makes the game tough to learn. Compounding the problem is that there is no manual for the game. There isn't really a tutorial for the game either, at least there wasn't when I was learning the game. I ended up learning the rules by reviewing the in game encyclopedia and by watching some gameplay videos. I've completed both campaigns that come with the base game, plus the campaign in the first DLC, almost 200 hours of really enjoyable gameplay. City management in the game is simple, which is fine with me, I enjoy the combat more in turn based strategy games. The combat is great, lots of variety, great graphics - wonderful fun. You can have the AI play out the combat for you and it does a reasonable job, but I rarely use this feature because the combat is such great fun. Overall, I highly recommend this game. Much more fun than Endless Legend (which was more like Endless boredom to me)

I previously played Williams Pinball Hall of Fame by the same developer on the Wii, so I had some idea what to expect. My initial impression of PA wasn't that positive. The graphics are of course a huge improvement over the Wii tables, but somehow the tables didn't seem to be as enjoyable. My initial reaction was to blame PA, thinking that the physics of the PC version weren't as good, which would have been really unexpected given the power of modern PC. I think my issue with PA is that recently I have been playing a lot of Pinball FX2 on my PC, and enjoying the FX2 tables a lot. PA tables are real pinball tables, which is good and bad. Some of the better pinball tables in PA are great. My major problem with most of them, and it is no fault of PA, is that they are almost always designed for short gameplay in arcades. This isn't a problem for pinball experts, but for at best average players like me it can result in frustratingly short games with low scores - the ball frequently drains. Obviously there is no way around this, and now that I realize what was bothering me, I'm starting to really appreciate the many fine qualities of the tables in PA.

I'm surprised at all the really positive reviews for this game. As someone who really likes turn based RPGs, I thought this game would be great. I can't remember being so disappointed in a game recently, everything is so poorly done. I rarely give a game less than 5 out of 10, there is usually something I lik about the game, but not with this one. First big drawback - no manual. There is some poorly written in game help, but that's no substitute for a manual. I have no experience with the Shadowrun universe, perhaps if I had the concepts would have made more sense to me. Probably the biggest issue for me is the graphics. Usually I don't care about graphics if the gameplay makes up for them. Here the gameplay is lacking and the graphics are really poor. Everything looks cartoonish

My favourite adventure game of the past few years, and I've played a lot of them. Everything is great. An interesting and easy to follow story with some very humorous parts. Graphics and music/sound are excellent. Voice acting is good to excellent, the voice of the main character is excellent and his love interest is very good. Some characters like the various guards are obviously voiced by the same person, but this makes no difference. Puzzles are almost always very good. Usually the solution to a puzzle makes sense, only in a few cases are the puzzles not completely logical and even the few slightly illogical puzzles are not to hard to guess. I didn't have to use a walkthrough at all. The game takes about 8 to 10 hours to complete. I hope they do a sequel or another adventure with the same development team.

I liked the game enough to finish it, but that was mostly because I couldn't believe that such a poor game could be so highly rated. I noticed on Steam that not only is the game highly rated but also a lot of people have put serious hours into this game so obviously my opinion is in the minority. The story in the game is very poorly written, surely someone who use to be a writer can do better than that. There isn't much puzzle solving in the game, I just mucked around with things and always found very easy solutions to each level. The game is short, which, given how bad it is, isn't a bad thing.

This game could have been very good, and some parts of it are very good. As a fan of strategy/RPG games, this game should have been very enjoyable for me. The graphics are nice, and the game has a good variety of interesting monsters for you to fight. Battle maps are custom designed, which I prefer to random maps. There isn't any grinding, which normally would be a positive for me, but given how stingy the game is doling out experience (action points), this is a negative. However, the game balance is terrible, many battles are boring because they are so easy, but then you will get battles that are very frustrating. The character development is also extremely poor. It's very hard to know which skills/attributes work and which ones are next to useless. Even if you are careful you could end up with characters that aren't very effective because you choose the wrong things to upgrade. The developers pretty much abandoned the game a few months after release to start development of Blackguards 2. I use to be a fan of Daedalic games but their last few games, including Blackguards have not been very good.

A very mediocre and derivative game that is devoid of any charm. It reminds me of Zak & Wiki on the consoles, except Zak & Wiki is somewhat better. Clumsy interface, boring puzzles and no humour. I haven't liked much that Double Fine has produced, and the Cave is no exception. Gilbert is well past him prime, much like Sid Meier.

I've played this game for over 60 hours and I still have lots more levels to finish. So obviously I really like the game. Desktop Dungeons won't appeal to you if fancy graphics and sound are important to you. The graphics and sound are basic but very serviceable. If you enjoy strategy games with lots of variety, where a game (level) can be completed in 30 - 60 minutes, you will probably enjoy this game. Good strategies will almost always be the deciding factor, but luck plays a minor role. I found the game a tiny bit frustrating in the early going when I hadn't yet figured out many of the strategies, and when I got a tough dungeon layout it seemed a bit unfair. This would be a bigger problem if completing a level took more time.

As others have said the gameplay is okay but the interface is really poor. I find that in most modern games the interface is at least functional, maybe clunky but it works. In Skulls of the Shogun the interface is so bad it interferes with the gameplay. Selecting units when they are bunched up (which they often are because you gain a defensive bonus from groups) is an exercise in frustration. Wrong moves, which can't be undone are possible because of interface issues. There might be a reasonable game under the bad interface, but with so many other better games available why bother with this one?

It seems that this game is one of those love it or hate it games. I come down on the side of hate it, or at least I don't understand what makes this game worth playing. However, I don't like the idea of rating a game you dislike a zero unless the game is not only poorly designed but also extremely buggy. The only bugs I found in this game are the ones you are suppose to blow up with your towers, so I'll give it a four. Graphics are poor and sound is very annoying and repetitive. As others have mentioned, the game places a huge emphasis on getting a perfect score (loosing none of your villagers). It is important to get a perfect score because you need to do this on most levels to progress through the game. That's a truly idiotic game design decision, it should be up to the player to determine how close to perfect they want to get on a level. The iBomber tower defense games get this right by rewarding you with stars that you use to purchase upgrades.

Another greatly over rated PC game. I think this game mostly appeals to people who like to search out secrets. I dislike that type of game so I found to be mind numbingly boring. For such a simple game it runs pretty slowly on my PC, which runs most modern games very well. Controls with my Xbox wireless controller are a bit off, Fez would sometimes wander off and fall off the screen.

I've read really good things about adventure games from Wadjet Eye games, so I thought I would give Resonance a try. I've been playing adventure games since the early 80's, I started with the early Sierra games and Infocom text adventures. Graphics and sound usually don't matter much to me. But the graphics in Resonance are so bad they interfere with gameplay. For small items I often can't see an item, and I certainly can't tell what the item is. I thought the pixel hunt for interactive objects on a screen style of gameplay was dead and buried. The interface is clumsy as well. With all the great games Daedalic has been publishing lately I don't want to waste any more time with games that might have been impressive if they were released 20 years ago.

I liked this game for the first couple of hours I played it. But nothing really grabs me, everything is okay but nothing more. Windows Live is a huge drawback that knocks at least a couple of points off the score. If you like Metroid style games this game is okay, but there is too much backtracking when I've missed something for me to enjoy it. I was often unsure if I was stuck at a puzzle or if I had missed an item that I needed to move further in the game.

Waking Mars is an interesting game with unique (as far as I know) gameplay elements. You plant and in some cases feed plants on Mars to achieve various effects. Controls are simple, graphics and sound are also simple but don't detract from gameplay. But interesting play mechanics don't always yield fun gameplay and I found I had to force myself to keep playing to give it a chance. Perhaps once more plants are introduced it gets more interesting, but after discovering about 6-8 different plants I got bored and gave up.

Easily one of the worst Zeldas I've played, and I've played most of them. Controls are atrocious, the motion sensing doesn't add anything except frustration. As with the latest DS Zeldas, they are recycling the same gameplay over and over again. I suppose I could say that for most recent Nintendo games Mario, Zelda, Mario Kart nothing new or improved in any of them. Hopefully the new Zelda 3DS game will be better, it really couldn't be worse.

I really wanted to like this game as I usually like puzzle platformer games. As others have mentioned the graphics and music are great. Controls are not so great, even with a gamepad. The main reason I didn't like the game is that collecting things (whatever they are) makes up a large part of the game. The platforming and puzzles elements are nothing special and I really dislike games based on collecting things. If that is your type of game you will probably like Fly'n.

As a fan of the original PC version of Toki Tori, the sequel was a day one purchase for me. Unfortunately, after struggling to find something to like about the game for a couple of hours, I've moved on to something more enjoyable to play. The sequel changes gameplay significantly from the first game. There are no instructions for the game, you are suppose to discover everything. At first this sounded like a fun challenge, but after getting stuck a few times where I wasn't sure if it was because of a puzzle or because I didn't understand the game rules, it got to be annoying. Certain commonly used commands like rewind are no longer a single button/keypress. Now you have to chirp out your commands, which can require up to six button presses of varying lengths. Cute a first, then very annoying. The puzzles themselves aren't as interesting as the ones in the first game.

I really enjoy strategy games, and I particularly like strategy games that aren't clones of already released games. This game is definitely different from anything I've played before, but in this case different isn't better, it's worse. The major Issue I have with the game is that it is too difficult for me. I can usually complete strategy games at medium (normal) difficulty. Planets under attack has three difficulty levels, and I am now struggling to complete scenarios at any difficulty level above the lowest. This is a major issue because you need to win scenarios at the higher difficulty levels to gain stars to reach later scenarios. The developers of the game have admitted that the game is too difficult but they claim they cannot change this now that the game has been released (see response on Steam forum for the game). Obviously they could fix the problem but they choose not to.

I had high hopes for this remake of this classic. Unfortunately this is yet another wasted opportunity, Firaxis has struck out again (I also disliked Civ 5, Civ 4 was much better). I don't mind the dumbing down of gameplay if what was left in was well designed. But the game is a disaster horrible interface, average graphics and a really bad AI that cheats in frustrating ways. Civ 5 had an overly complex interface that looked pretty but wasn't very functional, the XCOM interface doesn't even manage to look nice. I would have preferred a single screen for each soldier that shows everything about the soldier their equipment, stats, abilities etc. Instead, in different parts of the game I see different information, and some is always missing or hard to access. So much button clicking, so many ugly game screens. I wish Firaxis would just sell the rights to these classics to a developer that has some talented designers/programmers. They obviously have none themselves and it's a shame to waste these licenses.

I love platform puzzle games, so I expected to like this game given the excellent reviews. I'm not sure what others like about this game, after finishing around 20 levels I couldn't force myself to play it anymore. Calling this a puzzle game would be stretching it, the puzzles are mostly switching between the various characters and jumping on them. This wouldn't be a problem except that the game forces you to repeat the same actions again and again. Keyboard control is terrible, particularly for jumping, I don't have a gamepad that the game supports. Graphics are very simple, which wasn't a problem for me as I was expecting that. Music is nice, in fact the music was the only thing that was well done in the game. If you want a puzzle platformer that is much much better than Thomas was alone, try Toki Tori, that one has inventive puzzles, no story but since when does a puzzle game need a story?

I loved Mario vs Donkey Kong on the GBA. I skipped MvsDK March of the Minis because I've had enough of playing Lemmings clones. I decided to give Mini-Land Mayhem a try because there hasn't been much that was worth playing lately on my DS. Mini-Land is a reasonably fun game, but some control issues and boring boss battles against Donkey Kong lessen the fun. Many of the items you select in the game require fairly precise control from the touch screen, something that the DS isn't great at. This is particularily a problem in the mini-games, which require a lot of quick selecting/drawing of items. The boss battles are a disappointment, to many random events make trying to obtain a high score frustrating. Overall the game is fun, but no where near as fun as the GBA Mario vs DK.