rocketpony

I don't know if this game is horror, but it's not even a little scary. At its core, it's just a survival crafting game with some really annoying mechanics designed to pad out play time. (Clunky controls, steep learning curve in combat, tiny inventory, long walks from re-spawn point to find your corpse, mandatory "base defence" sections at night that feel like a chore.) I've played for 5 hours and the story is nowhere to be seen (except for a couple of small suggestive bits in the prologue). You're just trying to survive as some spooky stuff is happening around you, but there is no context for any of it and no reason to get invested in the hero. In short, this is not so much survival horror as survival chore. Something to play if you want to recreate the experience of washing your dishes with a toothbrush and no running water, all without getting off your chair.

Beautiful game with intriguing world and immersive, dark atmosphere. And while I'm not a puzzle enthusiast, I found them to be interesting and reasonably challenging. Even the minimalist story told entirely through images I'm ok with. There's only one problem. The ending. I don't think it's a spoiler to say there's none. After I got invested into the main character and his quest, it felt like developers had shown me a giant middle finger. Imagine if the Lord of the Rings abruptly finished when Frodo enters Mount Doom with the one ring. It's that kind of an ending.

I am conflicted. This game offers interesting story, complex characters, very original world and challenging tactical RPG in the vein of Baldur's Gate (which I love). On the other hand, I am often frustrated by the game's mechanics. For example, why is it impossible to exchange items between party members? Why can't I enter turn-based mode at will? (To position and buff my team before starting the fight) Why can't I level up other team members the same way as the main character? (Instead of having the game do it for me) And so on. Every half-decent RPG I played, from Baldur's Gate to Dragon Age: Origins, has all of those features. Also, I've encountered a number of bizzare issues affecting progress. For example, in the Loose Ends (medical facility raid), you're invited to lock out reinforcements, but doing so means the battle never ends (because enemy is detected behind the locked door) and it's impossible to progress in the mission. Or there is a switch which should be clickable but isn't. And so on. There. I enjoyed Dragonfall A LOT at times, but at other times it's an exercise in frustration. So much that I decided to stop.

Worth playing for its story and writing, but the gameplay is painfully boring. Positives: - Interesting story and good writing. Even minor characters are often written with attention and detail. For example, I loved Vincent and Carmen and loved even more how their storylines unexpectedly intertwined later. Or the swamp hermit and his little secret. That's attention to detail you rarely get in video games. The story also has plenty of turns and twists and there's always some mystery. Unlike most games, it never becomes predictable. - The game attempts to provide player with some meaningful choices to make. Those choices do have consequences. It can sometimes feel silly how the game tries to frame a choice, but I still appreciate what they're trying to do. (Silly as in "would you like to kill this cute kitten or this cute puppy?" How about we don't kill any of them and instead eat something else?) - Great graphics and voice acting. - Hmm... how should I put it... Possibility to "bed" any female in sight is a nice original touch. This is the first game I see where a reward for completing a quest or selecting a right dialogue choice is sex. I mean second, there's still Leisure Suit Larry. Negatives: - The game is super easy on the top difficulty. The early game is a breeze with the knock-out spell, the late game is dominated by the fire spell (igni). 1 on 1, just about any monster can be slain by selecting the right sword, the right attack type and stacking on combos: they won't be able to hit you even once. Potions, greases and bombs are mostly unnecessary. The only places where you're at least slightly challenged are the chapter-ending bosses. - Bugs. This gotta be the buggiest game I played. (Aside from that time I used a Nintendo simulator to play Conker) It crashes and freezes all the time. I routinely get 'not enough disk space' message when trying to save (despite having 60Gb+). - I suspect inventory size was selected to make sure the game is not too easy. When the most challenging part of your game is inventory management, you know things are not going well.

This is what a real adult game looks like! It is smart, hilarious, crude and full of wonder. With most games I know exactly what to expect from the very beginning, but Conker didn't stop surprising me till the very end. Now, who do I have to bribe to get developers make more games like that?