The Other 99%: Destroy All Humans: Path of Furon

This game, actually isnt as bad as i was expecting.

We have a few issues with it. The parts designed to be "thrilling" arent, and the weapons being mostly useless, meaning we ended up using roughly 3 of them in the course of our playtime, as the first weapons were the ones we upgraded and used the most. Not like it matters however, because DNA, the games currency, is thrown at you left,right and center, making getting upgrades a matter of when, not a matter of if.

I think the main issue we have with the game that its not bad, it doesnt leave us feeling baffled and angry and confused, however its not good ethier, its full of bad sterotypes, shoddily cobbled together action sequences and main character who sounds like a bad Patty and Selma impression mixed with the slug lady from Monsters inc, mixed with Jack Nicholson. The game is far too repetitve as well. Each area us unique, but they all follow the mission formula of mind reading mission, kill some shit mission, do some other shit mission, boss fight. Its too rinse and repeat. It feels rushed.

The script for the game is just "eh", theres some funny lines, most of which are not said by the main character, leaving the "entertaining, funny" Alien character kinda just wasted and lost on us, because all the line delivery was just bad, and the main character is just uninteresting.

I think my view on this game isnt helped that the games that came before it were actually decent, like the first couple of games were well designed and the played really well. This game is just clunky and badly optimised, as shown when in the Not-France area (Belleville) the boss fight cutscene screamed at us, screen tore and crashed five times, and then finally system crashed after the boss fight. We didn't even finish the fucking thing because it kept crashing after the Not-France Boss fight. Not to mention after three chop and change cookie cutter levels prior to it, Not-France was just downright fucking boring.

One of the key features of the game is destroyable citites, but when we leveled an entire city, the game lagged awfully, its just not acceptable for a game released onto a system where the hardware doesnt change, optimise your fucking game.

Easily the best feature of the game is mind reading. Like honestly, thats where we genuinely laughed most. Some of the thoughts are brilliant, and they are unexpected, and they add a level of depth to the game that we find pretty good. The incorperation of the mind reading into the missions actually makes sense and is enjoyable. 

In total, its not bad, i dont hate it, but niether do i like it, but as bad as it is, its leaps and bounds better than Retribution, easily, because i actually enjoyed playing this game to an extent. Unlike that pile of shit it was actually playable and had potential to be decent, but it was too rushed and badly optimised to be a good game.

Dan

The Other 99%: A new thing to pass the summer.

Hi,

Im not dead.

Uni is done (for now)

Im unemployed (also for now)

So in the months till i return to Uni, im starting a new thing, a sort of series, based off an experience.

It all started with this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWxEwdGpIPQ

"Ride to Hell Retribution (1%)".

Yes, that fucking awful dog-shite game. On a day out with my friends, before we parted for uni, We found it, tucked away on the pre-owned shelf in CEX. That fucking god-awful dog shite bag of wank game. As per request in the video, we bought it, yes, me and my friend Oliver actually paid money for it. We split it, I spent £1.25 for 8 hours of gameplay and over the course of 4 separate days split over a year, we played it and i shit you not, i still feel ripped off. 

During this we encountered 4 system crashes, too many terrible awkward sex scenes, and enough explosions to give Michael Bay an seizure. But we beat it, despite it nearly beating us, nearly over a year since it came into our life.

But as the credits rolled, We felt this vaccum. It got us asking a question "is there anything just as bad as it, if not even worse? and if possible could we find it?".

So join us as we spend money we dont have, on games that arent worth it, for no apparent reason at all.

Because any game, AT ALL, has to be better than that steaming pile of horseshit. Probably.

Dan.

Fallout 4: lout...

Hark, a new year, and still the same shitty opinions of a teenager sat in his bedroom.

Fallout 4... (acquired from questionably legal means).

So yeah, back to the wasteland, that one in Boston. The premise is good. Totally not been done before... but it has. You know, in Fallout 3. With the whole missing parent thing. oh and the Brotherhood of steel shows up. like in Fallout 3, and there are other factions, like in Fallout 3, and there is a giant junk city, like in Fallout 3.The main plot is like Fallout 3 up until you find your father. You emerge from the vault journey across the wastes help/pissing on people to find your son/father, then you do shit with them, and then the game kicks off and throws some various spanners in the works.

By no means it the same, but its similar. Bethesda have expanded on the brilliant weapon modification system from New Vegas to levels of insanity, meaning that all weapons can now be modified to extreme levels, and all weapons are now viable into late game. For example , the 10mm pistol I first used has carried me safely to level 14 with few deaths. The modification system also works well as any mods you craft are attached to weapon, but you can remove them. and you can find weapons with random mods on. meaning you can access mods you cant currently craft by swapping them out with less powerful mods.

One thing that pisses me off about the game is the fact that everything can be used. So now looting buildings takes ages, and I end up carrying around more crap than an incontinent baby. In the early levels you need literally everything to progress, weapons, armour and junk. It takes the piss. Also the changes to the ghouls that make them zombie like is amazing, as they are much much more terrifying than they were in the past.

Settlement building is fairly easy. Within my first 8hrs, after saving the last minuteman and nearly being cleft in twain by a deathclaw, I had transformed sanctuary into walled and easily defendable place with a ton of food and water, power and other amenities. Then I just could not be arsed with the poxy other settlements. all I wanted to do in the end was just move everyone to sanctuary, but due to my computer having the processing power of the average potato, it was going to lag my game.

The new power armour system is what the fallout games has needed for ever. It makes power armour expensive to use, but also makes it worth it, as it massively boosts all your stats. However my all time favourite combo of Power armour and fist is now not viable. However being able to fly and not take fall damage is fun, you become more like a space marine from warhammer than a survivor of a post apocalyptic event. (GET ON MAKING THIS A THING). The graphics are certainly an upgrade and the atmosphere is still there, so not all bad.

I cant help feeling too with the insane shitestorm of mechanics and factions that they throw your way, right from the start, kinda means that you pust finding your kid off, and the excellent "Yes, Yes, Sarcastic Yes, Yes" dialogue makes it even harder to stick to the main story. The whole game for me is just a bunch of side quests, some that effect the world more than other.

In short, its abit disappointing, or its too different, I don't know which. it took what made Fallout great and kinda when , "yeah that was good, but look, we expanded on the Hearthfire DLC and made it better, then added zombies and nukes". Now that's not to say its not enjoyable, Fallout 4 is a good game, but it isn't a good Fallout game.

Steam: http://store.steampowered.com/app/377160/

Level: 8/10

Dan

Rant: My Payday 2penneth/ aftermath.

So yeah, shit when down during this years crimefest, where overkill in their infinite fucking wisdom decided that adding micro-transactions was a good thing to do. This pissed people off for three main reasons.


1. They lied about including them, and their forum mods handles the criticisms poorly
2. Their current business model means that they are now raking it in
3. They added it during an annual community event

This is my take on those three:

1. Way back when Almir said that Payday 2 would never have micro transactions, and up until recently that seemed to be the case. Then they added them and the community went to shit. First there was feelings of betrayal, which seeing as Payday is "a community driven game", was to be expected, considering that the micro-transactions turned the game into "CounterPay DayStike 2", and the skins added in the safes changed stats, building on the already pay2win nature of the game with the countless DLC's. Then when the community of the "community driven game" responded badly, they didn't get listened to, they got silenced by moderators who wouldn't allow Overkill to get criticised for a blatant stab in the back.

2. Many of the successful games on steam run on a combination of 3 different models.
 - Free, with Micro-transactions.
 - Paid with DLC.
 - Paid with Micro-transactions.

Take Team Fortress 2 for example, the game is free to play, with no DLC and then Micro-Transactions being tacked on. Originally you had to buy it. Then they added in the Mann-conomy and they made it F2P, but also gave a free item to the players who bought the game, and gave them an "trader" status as they had invested some money. People were not annoyed by this as they were compensated and free players had to make a transaction in the store to get the ability to trade.

AND ALSO ALL MAPS, WEAPONS, CLASSES, CONTENT ARE FREE.

Payday 2 is now a Paid game, with DLC, that restricts play, i.e not just new masks.etc, but actually locks maps, weapons, most of which are terrible, but then there are some which are really OP and very useful, and perk decks. and as of Crime fest, Micro transactions. Now adding them was a pretty stupid move, but then adding skins which increased the stats of weapons was just pure un-bridled dumb-fuckery.

3. It was just awfully timed. It was like telling someone they had inoperable cancer while they were out celebrating their birthday.

TL;DR Summed up into three reasons. Betrayal of the community, Fucking stupid business model, bad timing.

I mean there has to be some sense in what im saying. The player base has dropped by over two thirds since the introduction of Micro-Transactions. Also the reddit forum moderators have refused to work now, annnd the top sub-reddit on the PAYDAY 2 reddit is named "Fuck you Overkill"

Dan.

Magicka 2, Episode 2: Attack of the Spell Balance Beta.

Yes, I am alive, I'm just A) Lazy, and B) Pinned under mountains of A-level work, hence the lack of reviews,  but onwards to 5 minutes of your life your never getting back...


For any of this gobshite to make sense you need  , in fact need is abit strong, I recommended that you read this : http://lvlupreviews.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/magicka-2-i-learned-to-spell-again-very.html

So as those of you who are unfortunate enough to read my reviews, y’all may know that I have a slight distaste for Magicka 2, slight being a massive understatement, as left me with a massive sense of disappointment and a feeling of resentment towards pre-ordering, only recently cured by XCOM 2.
But all my bitching and whining is now irrelevant, well not irrelevant, but less justified. As far as the base game which was delivered unto my arms like a ugly new-born goes, it still dislike it. But now the baby has had extensive cosmetic surgery and is now looking and feeling a lot better.


They fixed the issue where elements wouldn't combine to make one element (e.g Fire/Water to steam) and also apologised  by adding a new combo element, Poison (Death and Water). This has made me a very very happy person indeed. As a result they scaled the enemies, but I don't care, as now I feel like that Overpowered red robed psychopath from the first game. Weapon enchantments actually do something and actually can hit your enemies and do quite significant damage, unlike the first game where you might as well have tried to batter them with a sachet of Ketchup for what it was worth.


After giving it some time the moving while casting has actually grown on me, and combinations from the first game that cheese'd enemies now cheese them slightly less. The Steam and lightning combo has been balanced, which means its useful against crowds, but useless against single targets.


The devs listened to the annoyed people, and instead of silencing their criticisms, they responded, and have as a result fixed their , not broken, but damaged game. They have returned it to what made the first game great and then made this game good. It will by no means ever be better than the first iteration of hotdog wielding robed lunatics kill each other with magic, but god damn it ALOT better, to the point where I will 100% it, because its fun now, and I am an achievement whore.


REVISED LEVEL: 8-9/10
Commendations for the Devs.
Game link : http://store.steampowered.com/app/238370/


Dan.

Dishonored: Blink and you'll miss it.

Nearly another month has gone by, and i'm still here, I think monthly reviews will suit me better as it will give me time to play something, but yeah ill see.

Dishonored is from Bethesda, REVIEW DONE 10/10 FINISHED LETS GO HOME

Where to start?

Well the initial mission pisses me off. Its a lot of standing around and doing nothing, some stuff about this plague bollocks, then a short fight, before you are forced to watch your boss die and her kid abducted, before you get accused for it, hence the "Dishonored" title. It annoys me more because i feel like i have failed before i've even begun playing. The story however is immaculate and really well thought out, throwing a few twists in that even threw me, and it was good, because it allowed me to actually get invested in the storyline.

The way in which the world is effected by how you play is also a very nice addition, if you kill more people, then the plague spreads, if you don't kill alot of people and instead knock them out or just plain avoid them, the plague doesn't spread. All the missions up until you defeat the High overseer require the target to be assassinated or , now this is where i LOVE this game, neutralized in a non-lethal fashion, This means that  you can complete the game without killing anyone. Its really clever, the way in which it effects the endings actually makes a difference, as the percentage of death leads to High, Low and Medium Chaos endings, meaning its ether a peaceful final level, a slightly less peaceful final level or a complete an utter bloodbath where you come out the other side looking like you have taken a holiday inside a woman on her period. The three endings are unique and actually made me do a second play through, something which not many games have ever made me do.

The mechanics of Stealth, Magic and Metal, are really well implemented, the Magic given to you by the Outsider allows you to teleport amongst other things. The "metal" is your basic combat gear of a sword, pistol, crossbow and various traps means you can combine them with "Magic" to be efficiently lethal. The stealth system is good, working off the principle of 'don't be seen', however the crouching when you sneak did cause me to sever more legs than the average Alton towers roller coaster.

The graphics are nice, on the highest setting they really do put some strain on your system, and they look amazing, Motion blur is in this game but its tastefully done, and its understandable as sometimes you are moving insanely fast, i.e 10ft in a second, and it doens't overwhelm you, so you can still feesably fight while moving insanely quick.

Audio is good, however some of the sounds,do sound like they were recorded down a corridor, and if you use a lower end sound transmitter, you will notice the difference, however its nothing that effects the game too badly, so its not really a "BOOO HATE IT" and more of a "Meh, could be better".

Controls are good,  Left for attack with Sword, CTRL for crouch, Right for Magic/Shooting, WASD/Space to move. Typical movement format and well implemented combat controls make this game very easy to learn to play, but insanely hard to master.

If i have one major complaint about it, its that its so damn short. Without the two DLC's i easily completed this in 5hrs, getting most of the collectibles and upgrades. I supposed playing on "I WANT YOUR FUCKING SOUL FOR BREAKFAST" difficulty will make it longer, and trying to stealth it would also do that, but i still can help feeling that a midget would be longer.

Overall its very deserving of the overwhelmingly positive it has on steam, and its another good game,but its got little to no replay-ability after the second time, and the DLC's are quite expensive, hopefully they go on sale soon.

Link: http://store.steampowered.com/app/205100

Level: 8/10

Dan

Hotline Miami: Brutal Murder Simulator 2012

Well, im back, after nearly a month of not typing anything.*yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay*, im unfortunately not dead, so back to the prayer mats everyone.

Hotline Miami, i can't really say much about this game. Its well made deserving of the 'Overwhelmingly Positive' it has on the Steam user reviews, as well as the 10/10 from Euro-gamer.
It is in short, and i don't use this word lightly, a masterpiece of a game.I suppose i better list somethings i like.

Firstly, it is obscenely violent, more bloody than the average period, yet the art style is amazing, so much so that it isn't on a level as bad a 'Manhunt', but it was bad enough to make the Australian government cry like babies and ban it sequel from sale in Australia. Its action packed, and it fits my play style well, which is "fuck it, ill improvise". The first level is easy enough, but by the final couple of levels you will break your "R" key restarting so many times. Levels are well designed, so i dont feel like im cleaning out the same apartment 30000000000 times.

The 8 bit style suits the game well, as it adds to the atmosphere, by adding quite significantly to the 80's theme of the game. It screams 80's and even thought art style is 'outdated' it still has the feel and pace of a modern game.

The story is surprisingly deep for on face value appears to be a version of "Whack 'em, Smack 'em Russians", Not putting any spoilers here, but the levels themselves are different, the Pre-level level and the After-level level for each level (Damn son, that's a lot of levels) sets you in your apartment, which changes in some small way for each Pre-level and a shop for each after-level, which again changes as you descend slowly into madness.

The Soundtrack is fairly funky, it has some nice music, always fun to listen to as its more of a background noise rather than a feature, as you become too focused on doing the level, and not on the minor details.

I suppose the only bad thing about it is the replayability, each level can only really be played once. This is unfortunate, but again it depends on the person playing, There are tons of achievements and masks to get meaning certain levels get more love than an easy girl at a party, as a fair amount of achievements require level specific weapons.etc.

Overall i love it, its fun, fast paced, easy to control, sounds good, doesn't lag, its an all round great play and recommended that you play/buy it. Remember if you are poor, wait for sales.

Link: http://store.steampowered.com/app/219150/

Level: 10/10

Dan