★★☆☆☆ A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.... SWBF2 was a masterpiece, and set every standard for the genre, with good gameplay concept, tons of content, and tasty Star Wars flavor, but its over a decade old now, hasn't aged well, and this is an awful port.
Reasons to Buy:
+ Lotso content + Star Wars Conquest!
Reasons to Bail:
- Barely functional port - Core gameplay is lacking and hasn't aged well
Pro/Con Feature Nags:
+ Jedi Heroes + Play with/against bots + Lotso voice acting and lite story + Recruit nearby NPCs for dynamic squads + Many visual (class), team, and map variety + Most CPs act as tactical choke points, instead of just random dots on an open map + Galactic Conquest and Campaign give context to regular conquest matches, somehow modern games (not just EA's) are too pathetically lazy for even that
+- Meaningful classes, but no customization
- Multiplayer is an unplayable spam of explosives - Limited stamina and clunky controls when sprinting or jumping - The main menu runs at some tiny resolution, and has a seizure every time it switches to the actual game - Controls don't work great on keyboard/mouse (especially in space), and controllers don't seem to work at all - Major graphic bugs. Exiting ADS leaves a half visible texture across a large portion of the screen. On some maps (Dagobah?) the neon pink normal-map for water is nonsensically displayed on top of the screen no matter where you look. - Low production values. The HUD is lacking and looks like modern indie games' should-be-placeholder programmer art, death cameras are janky, 3rd person mode has an awkward character interpolation lag, weapons feel a bit off with slow bullet (lazer) travel time and RNG accuracy instead of recoil, etc
* Discord overlay causes black screen * You'd be better off getting this on an emulator * Was good couch coop back in the day, but that's irrelevant on this version
★★☆☆☆ In theme and theory, Natural Selection 2 is the greatest game of all time. A playable version of the movie Alien, where one team controls the aliens. However, it fails so hard at execution that it barely qualifies as playable.
- As a shooter, guns have zero recoil, no ADS, and 0% accuracy. Ammo supply is nonexistent, and TTK is instant nonsense, as you attempt to track bunny-hopping aliens on crack. - As conquest, core mechanics are painfully convoluted, with no HUD or direct way to capture locations. So you're always lost, and not sure what to do, even if you do manage to find the right area. - As an RTS, the commander is overwhelmed with unintuitive micromanagement, every building needs to be going up at the same time, and then have upgrades running at that same time, and new bases need to be setup, and they have to direct troops/robots, and they have to manually deploy heals and ammo and temporary shields to everyone on the team, all at once, always and forever.
- The core objective is progressive, spawn killing, base r@pe. What should be a banable offense... is the core objective. Bad. - 99% of the time you'll be using an uncustomizable attachmentless assault rifle. - There's no way to setup a kit (but no variety anyway), so each time you spawn you have to remember to manually buy your items from the booth, which most of the time ends in you running into the field without a welder. - TTK is ridiculous and seems unbalanced/broken from both sides. Put 4 mags into that alien? It didn't die? Then killed you in 2 hits? Well, that's not right. So switch sides to the aliens! Bit that guy 4 times? He didn't die? Then killed you in a single shotgun blast? WTF? - Only one person can be the commander. For the progression bits, that sort of makes sense, but for base building it sucks. Though one of the aliens is more or less capable of building bases on its own. - Rampant with non-optional mods that fail to download - Menus have no backgrounds, so its impossible to see half the options - TTK would probably play better if normal HP was more like the Mech's - Playerbase is dead, and they already have skins for sale, not sure why it hasn't gone free2play. - Quickplay is useless. Put me into a server from China, where I had like 400 ping, and then into an empty server. Manual server browser works though.
+ Captures the Alien theme well + Community seems nice enough + Aliens can travel through wall tunnels + The way healing works, by welding peoples over-armor, is interesting + The visual change from alien control, to clean, to no power, to marine control, is neat
★☆☆☆☆ Dissidia NT's graphics will sparkle your eyes, and its soundtrack will soothe your soul, but 3v3 with team-lives means you don't matter and can't win, even vs bots, no less vs players, then add lag and things gets literally unplayable, so don't waste your time.
Reasons to Buy:
+ Final Fantasy Fanboy Hype!
Reasons to Bail:
- That moogle - PSP version was deeper - 3v3 is convoluted nonsense - Lag makes multiplayer unplayable - Team-lives make the game unwinnable
Pro/Con Feature Nags:
+ Best Roster + Best graphics + Best soundtrack
+- Summons? are a thing... +- Weird business model, though it looks fair enough if purchased in full? Assuming it includes everything. +- 3v3 is nonsense, should have done something like Marvel vs Capcom, or just kept the assist system from the previous Dissidia +- Would be nice if you could customize/randomize the music while matchmaking, so you aren't stuck listening to the same generic non-classic song 90% of the time.
- Weekly hero rotation - Limited Dash Stamina - Terribad Steam integration - Long load times, even on SSD - Slowmo finish doesn't show the attack - No way to break stun-locks or combos? - Laggy graphic and network performance - Can't do anything else while in matchmaking - Long Queue times, then it gives up and puts you vs bots - Characters get like an hour of iFrames after being hit by a combo - Frame rate caps, randomly, at either 30 or 60, and the ingame FPS counter only displays that cap, not your actual FPS - All RPG elements and customization have been removed. Like 99% of the abilities are gone, and you can no longer customize your playstyle. - That moogle, gives the most idiotic combat tips, nonstop (you can turn them off in options), and says Kupo like its a word, instead of a noise, at the end of literally every sentence. - There is basically only one mode in this, which is the basic 3v3 battles, either online or vs AI. There is no story mode, dungeon crawl, conquest, RPG, survival mode, or anything else.
The PSP version is far better overall, this is basically just a hardware upgrade, while a massive downgrade to gameplay, features, and everything else.
★★★☆☆ * This is a negative review because coop is so broken, singleplayer it if you want. Frisky Rain takes all the progression and build variety of an actual game, like Diablo, and devolves it into a gambling simulator; where RNGesus decides your playstyle, and then your savefile is intentionally deleted every 30 minutes or so.
No way is this over-hyped ultra-simplistic glorified-slot-machine worth $20. I mean, its not a cancer on gamekind, like LoL, Overwatch, or PUBG, but to be the top selling game on Steam for weeks now? How did it manage that?
Make it free2play, sell some skins instead, fix coop, and add ~10x more content worth seeing.
Pro/Con Feature List: + The first game since RE4 to do a 3rd person camera right, centered over the player
+- Default keybinds are jank, but can be changed +- Hand crafted map variety, but they repeat every match +- Items show on players, but this is lazily done, and often overlap +- Takes ~30 minutes to get fun, not sure its even possible in coop +- Graphics are ugly in style, and technically lacking, but do get high FPS
- Many bugs - Fall damage - Early Access - No host migration - No map and/or minimap - Non-instanced coop loot - No inventory management - Engi is the only viable class - Can't see item info before buying - No reward/reason for higher difficulties? - Lunar items are all game ruining debuffs - Doesn't tell you how to unlock characters - Default "Commando" class is un-fun to play - A single player can activate teleporters in coop - Has achievements, but they aren't integrated with Steam - Enemy spawns are based on standing in an area too long? - Not knowing where the teleporter is by default is nonsense - Items lack % information, in a game all about collecting % items - Only being able to rez players by moving to the next stage is dumb - Hard to keep up with chat, because every item picked up is auto-said there - Would be far less frustrating if the Radar was a default feature, instead of a rare item - No drop-in coop is game breaking, but with the way progression works, it would be broken either way. - Quick match is barely functional, and netcode can be epic lag if the host is bad, and you can't even see ping - Many people commend the soundtrack for this game, but I find it negligible at best, and grating at worst, like a worse version of Mass Effect's loading screen music. I've actually turned it off in favor for my own at this point. - Not being able to customize kits/weapons sucks. Having turrets is nice, but the engi's main weapon is garbo and he has no mobility skill. The robot is basically just a 100% better version of the commando. The huntress is good early game, but fails lategame. etc.
★★★☆☆ +- Insurgency's level of realism is interesting, but perhaps excuses otherwise bad game design (friendly fire, no DBNO, no auto-reloads, non-existent HUD, etc). +- Basically plays the same every match, and would benefit from randomized/non-linear objectives. +- Customization is lacking, but not especially relevant in a game where you play as a floating gun.
- Crashed on several occasions, and has generally poor performance.
★★★★☆ ACO is one of the best games in years, the best Assassin's Creed since Brotherhood, and the best Greek/Spartan simulator of all time. But its still borderline unplayable, because of rubbish level-gating, and graphics that can't hit 30 FPS on a 1070.
Reasons to Buy:
+ Pretty world + Interesting story + Climb everything + Engaging combat + (This. Is. Sparta!) people off cliffs
Reasons to Bail:
- Level gating - Poor performance
Pro/Con Feature Nags:
+ Float a Boat + Auto-pilot Unicorn + Freely respec at any time + Screenshot sharing on the map + This! is! Sparta! people off cliffs + Equipment vanity system/collectibles + This Greek open world is a unique joy to explore and take in + Interesting story, though the dialogue and voice acting could be better + Climb anything, and fall damage isn't fatal, but the animations have gotten lazy + Eagle Vision is a literal eagle, and a nice alternative to constantly pulling up a "paper" map. + The inventory system is pretty intuitive, dynamically expanding as you collect stuff, but it would be less confusing if it didn't show a row of empty slots by default + City guards have more or less been removed, and replaced with a steady stream of semi-unique mercenary/bounty hunters that come at you bro(!) if you commit crimes + There's an infinite amount of side quests. Basically those generic quests you could send your followers on in previous AC games, which would AFK complete in the background after 10 minutes, are now actual quests in the world.
+- Barely feels like an AC +- Do horse skins effect stats? Confusingly, no. +- Artistically, the graphics are amazing. Technically, they're rubbish. +- Menus are driven by a mouse cursor, even on controller. It works, but its a bit strange +- You can kidnap everyone in the world to join your crew, but can only use 4, and those 4 do practically nothing, so its kinda pointless. +- There's some kind of conquest mode, where you can change ownership of zones between the Spartans or Athenians, but it seems pointless. +- By default, quests don't actually show you where to go, they just give you vague directions. In an attempt to encourage exploration? But you can turn on normal quest markers. +- There's technically a crafting/gathering/scrapping system, but the best way to handle it is to just sell the equipment you find and buy the mats from the vendors that do the upgrades +- You can tame an animal, but its kinda pointless since they just die the first time you get in combat with anything. I went out of my way to tame a level 20 elite/rare bear, and it got killed by a regular level 18 bear in a 1v1 while I was busy fighting bandits. Nonsense.
- Lacking the bonus objectives and replayability of ACB - You can't use a shield, even though enemies can, and its quite Spartany - Every assassination animation involves punching a guy in the balls. Weird - Level gated nonsense. Do 0 damage to, and get 1shotted by random enemies, because numbers - Poorly designed stat based gear. Find an epic legendary weapon of doom. Level up once. Find a gray trash item with better stats. What? - Not enough hotkeys for abilities. Forces you to manually swap them between stealth/combat, and most of the ranged ones are wasted. You can unlock a 2nd bar, but its like 20 hours into the game, and its clunky. - On top of the level gating, and poorly designed stat progression, neither of which is necessary to begin with, the world levels up with you, so you never actually get stronger, only impossibly weak.
* Controller recommended, and use the alternate controls option, because the default is nonsense. A to run? Triggers to attack? GTFO
★★☆☆☆ - Combat system is rubbish. In a fighting game. - "Town as a Menu" is unintuitive. - Graphics and voice acting miss the mark. - Controller support is broken, and doesn't display the proper buttons. - Story is weak. If you aren't already a DBZ fanboy, then you'll have no idea what's going on. If you already are, then there isn't enough difference here to be worth sitting through again.
★★☆☆☆ Far Cry 5's story is disgusting, and forced down your throat at regular intervals, ruining the fun/freedom of an open world. That's reason enough to avoid this game, but even if it wasn't, every single part of this game is an inferior version of FC4; progression, towers, arsenal, locale, grappling, somehow the graphics even got worse...
★★☆☆☆ When you were playing Uncharted 4, did you ever think to yourself: "Man, this is great, but I wish there was a version where Nathan Drake was some whiny incompetent charmless cringe, and the gameplay held my hand so tight that it devolved everything into a QTE!"? Well, you're in luck!
Pro/Con Feature List: + Visual equipment upgrades
- Floaty auto stealth - Floaty cover system - Camera controls regularly hijacked - Story constantly jumps around in time - Alternate costumes don't show damage - Alternate costumes have pay2win perks - Learn languages... by reading languages? - Can't interact with loot if inventory is full - Crashed several times with DX12 enabled - Collectible notes (at least they're fully voiced) - Can only fast travel from campfire to campfire - Perfect positioning required to interact with simple objects - Microtransaction card packs, I'm not even sure where to use the cards - Survivo-vision can't be used while moving, and isn't a pulse, or lasting highlight - Graphics look okay (with AA off, because there's no proper AA setting), but have no style whatsoever, and while they run at 90+ FPS, there are issues with stuttering and screen tearing. Vsync causes ridiculous input lag. - Unresponsive controls. Holding shift fails to maintain sprint. Jumping while climbing requires a full stop first, else you flail in the wrong direction to your death. Interactions can often fail even when positioned perfectly.
* Got the complete edition on sale 75% off for $15. Still not worth