Carrionjr 님이 최근에 작성한 평가

If you don’t know what Mortal Kombat is, then it’s likely you either don’t play many fighting games or have been living under a rock for the last 25 years. The game makes an excellent return/reboot, with smooth graphics, brutal x-ray special moves and fatalities everyone except the censorship board loves.

Pulling off a reboot of the series that has 20 years of history and characters was risky, but I thought it was very well done. It lets newer players get up to speed with the story, while not giving veterans the shaft(eg completely ignoring everything that has come before). If you haven’t been following the story (there’s 8 games prior to this one) then the earth realm has finally lost to Shao Khan. Just as Raiden is about to die and Shao Khan is about to merge earth realm, Raiden sends the thought “he must win” back to before the first tournament, hoping to change time and prevent the current situation. As expected this goes completely awry, which drastically changes what happens to characters and future events as the game progresses. The game takes place over the first 3 games, but as the events unfold the changes in time constantly escalate the situation, so by the end of the first 1/3 of the game (the first tournament) events are well and truly heading down a different path. It wasn’t a straight reboot but injected something new so veterans of the series had something to look forward too.

The story focuses on one character for about five fights before shifting perspective to a different fighter. I thought this was good, it requires you learn a little of each character, enough of their moves and motivations before jumping to the next character. Rather than do a straight arcade mode (where you fight 10 opponents and then get that characters ending) each set of fights forwards the overall story and plot, and you see how majority of the characters interact with each other. I thought it was well done and set it apart from many of the other fighters that are available (which only function in an arcade mode setting). It was good playing as characters before they had been introduced in the original games (Cyrax), and it good seeing what all the newer characters were doing long before they were introduced (Cyrax, Sektor, Stryker, Kabal)

Fighting wise there are as ton of moves for each character, even if you are inept button mashing will usually perform some sort of move. There is a block option but I can’t say I really used it. I’m not sure if it’s just my preference but I find activating moves in Mortal Kombat a lot easier than street fighter 4, which reduces frustration quite abit. As one of the series main stables the moves are brutal, with blood gushing everywhere, and it’s no different in this game. A new feature was the x-ray specials, where if it connects it focuses on the receiving character and zooms into seeing them have their bones broken or organs punctured. These are graphic and do good amounts of damage (33-50%), if used correctly then they can be an auto win for a round. The fatalities are back (in all their glory) however many need to be unlocked through hunting through the krypt.

The character line-up involves most of the characters from the first three games, with the dlc characters being auto added in the steam version. The characters are rendered well (all the ladies are still in the skimpy fighting clothes that are a mainstay of the series), and it’s good to see that as you dish out damage the fighters become to look haggard, with cuts, bruises, bloody patches, torn muscles and damaged clothing. Some characters are more usable than others, with some being abused to the point of making it a choir to play against (Noob Saibot I’m looking at you)

The stages are again very nice to look at (silent forest is my favorite), with some stages having stage facilities. The music and sound effects are very well done, and the announcer voiceover never gets boring (or hearing scorpion’s catch phrase as he hurls his spear)

As mentioned before there is the standard arcade mode, which explains what each character does when they win the tournament. The big addition is the challenge tower, 300 fights that progressively harder until you are screaming at how unfair the fight matchup is and rage quitting. The reward is an interesting choice. The krypt has plenty of fan service, with unlockables, music, concept art and stage modifiers.

When I played this I couldn’t get multiplayer to work very well, but having an internet connection that is stuck in the early 90’s might be the main factor of this. I’m not sure if many are still playing this.

If you are chasing 100% achievements then it’s unlikely that you will get it as there are a fair amount of multiplayer achievements that require x wins in a row, king of the hill points or 100 online wins.

Far Cry 3 is a first person, open world, action adventure revenge story that starts after you and your group of friends skydive into trouble by landing in a pirate infested island. This game was very well received and if you haven’t already played it then I recommend that you should.

Once the game actually starts in the prison camp (there is a good 5 mins of watching your group of friends party and get up to mischief) you are given a brief tutorial on the major concepts and meet the games first antagonist Vaas (who I think might be one of the better enemies I have seen in a game). Once you are free of the camp and been inducted into the local tribe (Rakyat) the game really opens up. You can continue with the story missions, scale one of the many radio towers to unlock the map, hunt animals for upgrades, liberate areas by capturing the settlements or collect any number of collectables, compete races (usual Ubisoft fare). There is plenty to keep you occupied, though by the end it does start to wear thin if you are trying to do everything (there is only so much you can do before it gets repetitive). If you played like I do then you will likely see yourself scouting for towers so you can see the map, do a few missions then look to see what side quests are available to work towards the unlocks that you want.

Some of the characters were designed very well (Vaas, Citra, Dennis, the drug making botanist Dr. Earnhardt), but others are walking cliché (your ex military brother Jason, your stoner friend, the CIA agent, the second antagonist Hoyt). It’s a hard line to make the characters relatable, but not cliché and I think when designing some of these characters they might have leaned a little on the safe side. You start off weak and afraid, but by the end revel in the killing and its interesting watching the surviving friends react to you as you slowly become more feral. I thought the end’s game choices (stay or leave) were very well done, and fit well with the story. I personally didn’t like your main character, I thought he was a cocky brat, which never really changed throughout the story. To be fair he does realize he is starting to enjoy the killing and tribal life and is dedicated to saving his friends and brothers, and by the end does comprehend he is going to have to live with the killings forever -this is good that it’s mentioned but also strange as I could understand if he had killed just a few people, I swear I killed 100’s, at this point you would think he would be immune to that.

I found the game to be very good, graphically it looks and plays great and I didn’t notice any sort of glitches or screen tearing, though I did notice a slight slowdown when I was burning the drug farms (never happened with burning the settlements) and I wasn’t playing at 4k. The sound effects were good overall, I found the guns sounded good, the cars sounded good (though were a pain to drive).

Like a lot of Ubisoft games the upgrade path is locked to you completing story missions and additional objectives, so weapons that you can stock up on and use at any of the unlocked settlements might be limited until you start clearing some of these away. The game is pretty forgiving, if you die you end up at the closest settlement where you can re-try whatever killed you or move onto something else. Ammo and equipment is plentiful, so I never found myself really running out (unless I was firing wildly like a maniac).

The monkey business DLC was funny (I’m not sure if Hurk is meant to be a joke character), but didn’t really offer much to the game other than a few funny side quests. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to play the multiplayer as it was pretty much dead by the time I played this. I’m not sure if the servers are still available.

There aren’t any steam achievements, though you do need to link the game to the Ubisoft Uplay store, so if you have some aversion to that then this might not be the game for you.

Instead of being another sequel, Tomb Raider is set when Lara Croft is a fledging adventurer, out on her maiden quest to prove the existence of the lost kingdom of Yamatai with one of her father’s closest friends and her mentor.

If you haven’t already played this, you should. In the past I haven’t really been a fan of the Tomb Raider series, but this game brings it all together in such a way that makes it enjoyable. The gameplay is top notch, visually it looks stunning, the story flows nicely and the game doesn’t outstay its welcome, if you want to collect things and hunt for them its fine, but it’s not an integral part of the game. The hub area which connects all of the different places on the island is well designed and lets you speak with remaining crew members. The game isn’t overly hard, the fights are good with most enemies only needing a few hits to kill and the platforming areas aren’t unforgiving (like some of the tombs in the Assassins Creed series). If you do manage to die then you don’t usually lose too much progress.

You control Lara as the expedition runs into trouble, and learn to run, hunt, crawl, zipline and fight your way through the islands current inhabitants and supernatural foes while trying to rescue your rapidly diminishing crewmates and friends. I found the game to be visually stunning, with many varied environments -forest, beach, mountains, crashed ships, Japanese inspired villages and of course tombs to explore. I was playing with high settings (not 4k) and didn’t notice any visual distortions or drops, and in some areas there were plenty of enemies on screen. There were some QTE events, but these weren’t all the time and never frustrating.

I thought the story was explained very well, as mentioned the pace is quite solid. The mysteries of the island and setting aren’t dumped on you, but are fed to you enough that you have a good idea of what is going to happen, and watch as Lara and crew piece it together. Some of the “big” events that happened (certain crew & friends dying, friends betraying Lara) I could see happening long before they did, so it’s not a total shock when they do happen, and it fuels Lara’s growth in the game (from being a meek graduate and breaking down when she makes her first kills, to mowing down enemies and supernatural foes in the end). A lot of what is going to happen is foreshadowed if you collect the lore items and explore the optional tombs littered around the maps.

The upgrade system was well done, it ties in closely with the main plot, so you will have everything you need by the end of the game (unlike other games like Just Cause 3 where you can finish it and have unlocked virtually nothing). There are side quests and lots of collectables to find, some explaining more lore of the island (foreshadowing future events), some unlocking achievements. There are challenges to complete which might upgrade carrying capacity ect (again majority of these should easily be done while playing the game).

Most of the DLC that is available is for multiplayer, so you can consider it useless unless you have a group of friends who also own the game and are going to play with you.

If you are chasing 100% achievements then its likely impossible now, as multiplayer is dead. Not sure if you could grab a few others and farm the achievements.

Dragons Dogma: Dark Arisen is a 3rd person action fantasy game where your character roams around an open world environment after surviving a Dragon attack on their village and being revived as an arisen.

I found the plot of the base game and the expansion (Dark Arisen) to be very good. Other than early on you aren’t drowned in lore or background and the story progresses smoothly and at a steady pace. The end goal of the game is explained to you right at the beginning (slay the dragon and recover your heart), and the rest of the game follows the journey to challenge the dragon (with a few reveals along the way). Dark Arisen continues at a nice pace and the optional Dungeon (Bitterblack Isle) is a very nice challenge to those interested -and can be accessed pretty much at the beginning of the game if you want to watch your character die repeatedly. The end game equipment makes this worthwhile. I did like the optional endings, while there is really only one path you are going to walk, it’s fun that they actually included a few extras.

Gameplay wise you have quite a few options, as you start with 3 classes which expands to 9 (which influence how much of each of your stats level up). Each class also unlocks certain skills which can be applied to any class after you have unlocked them, which gives you a fair amount of customization by the end of the game depending on your playstyle. Each class also limits what weapons and armor you can wear, so there is a fair bit customization allowed (thought no changing the color of the armors). One thing that wasn’t explained is how the monster defense works (which you generally shouldn’t have an issue with unless you are looking at Death, the UR Dragon or Damien). Its dishearten to find out that your lvl 100 character won’t be able to get the best results from some the best equipment in the game because certain stats are to low (magic def and physical def) are both calculated for each monster (with physical def going first). Hybrid characters might be stung with this, or at least have challenging bosses made more difficult than what they already were. With the correct equipment they should still be possible. The first 6 classes are available to your pawns, so you generally find your weakness should be covered in most instances. The big monster fights are fun, with you climbing up on legs, backs and necks to hack away for added damage.

The Pawns are an interesting concept, if you allow online connectivity then pawns from other players join your game and can help on quests if you choose them. This gets them money and items and they can help you by advising on how to best default monsters they have already encountered. This needs be incorporated in more games as I found it was a very helpful concept, and I didn’t have to worry about people trolling my game (it did increase the save times every time I rested).

Graphicly I found the game to look pretty good at 4k (it was ported in 2016), I didn’t suffer any major graphical hiccups or glitches. The monster graphics looked good, however some were abit squarish (I didn’t expect this to change as the base game is from 2013). Sound was pretty good as well, with the monsters shrieking and growling, the pawns yelling commands and the sounds of swords and magic spells slamming into enemies. I would have loved to have been able to dress as Gutz (from Berserk), but that DLC wasn’t included (not even as an optional DLC).

If you are chasing 100% achievements then it’s possible with a bit of grinding as you will have to do at least 2 playthroughs, a separate speed run (with no saves) and get your character up to lvl 200.

Cayne is a sci-fi horror point and click adventure. You play has Hadley, a pregnant woman who after getting involved with the Cayne corporation awakens to find herself trapped in a dimly lit lab, a menacing technician nearby, and a machine about to perform a womb extract on her now heavily pregnant body. After escaping it’s all downhill from there.

I thought to story of Cayne was told very well, from Hadley conversing to herself and the trapped voice to the bits and pieces of background that are scattered around on pdas and computer terminals. Cayne is a shortish game(depending on how well you solve the puzzles), and it drip feeds you enough to keep you interested at all times.

Having not played a point and click game for years, it did take a while to get used the basic controls and how to play again (items that you need are highlighted, but what they can be used on aren’t), there isn’t a tutorial on anything and if you haven’t played something like this before then you might get stuck easily (combining equipment together comes to mind). I guess I have been spoilt by games dumbing puzzles down for me over the last 2 decades, some of the puzzles were generally hard to figure out. Codes for areas aren’t remembered in game, so if you don’t have an excellent memory a notepad might be good to have on standby. This is the same for other bits of information you find- this could lead to a fair bit of backtracking as some puzzles are split over 4-5 rooms each and might get repetitive if you are manually scanning the room for the icon the change.

The game is very dark and twisted, and the encounter with Samantha early on sets up a tension that lasts right to the end of the game. You can die but it’s usually due to being inattentive rather than the game being cruel (my Hadley didn’t even make it off the table on the first screen as I was trying to figure out what to do). I thought the tension increased when the power went out (that was the only thing separating you and Samantha and you now have a greater idea about what she is willing to do after reading all the PDA’s about her). This is where I thought it would turn into a timed game of trial and error (eg you getting chased around the stages), I was happy when this wasn’t the case. The background that you do find only adds to the horrors that you encounter- by the end of the game I think there were only 2 or 3 people who I actually wanted to survive (poor Frank), I was kind of glad a lot of the others had an implied death due to the events of the game. It got to a point that I felt sorry for Diane (a character you meet very early on) who you are responsible for maiming, other than being a horrible person his biggest crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time compared to the others (that just how bad the others seem after reading information about them). That said the overall plot is very open to interpretation and the ending does leave many questions unanswered. I would love a follow up that continues in this world and mentions what happened/ who survives both this game and Stasis.

Graphically the game looks great and runs well at 4K. There is a very real feel that something has drastically gone wrong with organic looking growth just outside the lab you start off in, some doors opening like a sphincter does and making squelching noises. Once you get out of this hidden area it turns into a standard sci-fi lab area, with force fields, gantries, and separate lab areas. Why you don’t see many of the crew’s deaths (a fair few of them aren’t even mentioned) the stages show that something gruesome has happened with blood trails lining walls and floors, again building the suspense that something nasty waits around the corner. The sound effects are good, you listen to Hadley grunt, groan and whimper her way around the stages. The voice work of both Hadley and the trapped voice are really well done. The background music helps build the suspense- at one point I heard a noise and screams and was expecting something to appear on screen.

If you are chasing 100% achievements then it’s possible, but you will be playing with a guide. While some hidden achievements just require you clicking on things, others require you to stand in certain areas or input codes found in different rooms and use multiple items on certain pieces of equipment.

Icewind Dale was originally released in 2000, and hasn’t aged that well over the last 18 years. While the gameplay remains solid (based on the Advanced Dungeons and Dragon’s ruleset), the max resolution is 800*600, which was fine then, but is a challenge to play with now. Beamdog have released the Enhanced version, which allows much higher resolutions and UI improvements, additional classes and class kits from Baldur’s gate 2 as well as new ones, new magic spells, new weapons, achievements, a story mode for those who want to race through the game and the 2 add ins Heart of Winter and Trials of the Luremaster.

Unlike the Baldur’s Gate series, you create your full team from the get go, and go forth to solve the town of Kuldahar problems (or just to try and escape if you are evil). The story hasn’t been changed, and either has the music. Both were excellent and still remain excellent. If you didn’t like the additional characters that were added into Baldur’s Gate 1 & 2 (and the additional bugs and quests) then you don’t have to worry about that happening here.

Being able to run the game in higher resolutions is a godsend, however the landscape/character/enemy graphics themselves haven’t been improved. What this means is that if you zoom in, it turns into a blurry mess. It’s a shame, as back in the day the graphics were really well drawn and they just don’t look nice now. Having the ability to zoom out is great (this is how you will be playing the game), as is being able to highlight everything (I don’t remember this being an option in the original). I think some of the animations for magic spells have been updated (again I could be wrong on this)- they look better than I remember.

I remember Icewind Dale being an unforgiving game first time I played it, even having prior knowledge of how D&D played. There’s nothing like watching your lvl 1 mage get instantly killed before they can cast a spell by a goblin with a bow and arrow. While this changed as you levelled up (max level 30 for each class) the game always felt hard, like you were on the back foot. The biggest change in this regard is the inclusion of the new classes and kits, which break the difficultly in stupid ways. Monks that are immune to normal weapons at lvl 20, sorcerers, archers, blackguards- you name it, it likely has made the game easier to play. It seems that some of these weren’t integrated correctly, as sorcerers don’t have a primary stat (should be charisma), so you have a free reign to make them a secondary fighter. That said, its great fun to play with these classes. Monks were missing in the original and have been my favourite in every game since, and while I can’t force myself to give up quivering palm to play as a Sun Soul Monk, the amount of undead in the game would likely be worth it.

Some of the added weapons are crazy good as well, but they are limited. Archers will only have 2 good bows in the game, and many weapon types don’t have a good option (either to buy or find). I guess this can help even out the classes (as many characters will be fighting over the same weapons).

If you don’t want the frustration of having to revive dead characters, or aren’t sure if your party is any good then you can play them Story Mode. Heart of Fury mode is back, and if you want a challenge is worth doing (it’s not easy with a high level team). That said summons scale up with the difficulty, so you can just summon a stupid amount of mobs to fight for you which is game breaking in your favour. This was implemented much better than the Bhaal difficulty in the Baldur’s gate games.

Now having played with the latest 2.5.10 patch the game still has a few problems (good to see the game is still getting updates 3 years after its release). I had random crashes to desktop when I was in lower Dorn’s Deep. Story mode and Heart of Fury mode would turn off for me if I saved and exited. Deleting previous games is a mentioned fix and I see in the bug notes that this should be fixed in the next update (I played the game in 1 session inside a VM to get around this). Some quests award you twice. Getting the achievement for learning Maverons Rage would only pop if the game wasn’t in Story or HoF mode for me.

The one caveat for all of the above (except achievements) is there are plenty of mods for the original game that perform most of what has been included. It might be easier to purchase this edition, than hunting around random websites for mods and instructions on how to install them.

100% achievements are possible but will require a few runs, (solo mode, hof mode, class specific achievements) if you keep the above bugs in mind.

Tyranny is a game that I had high expectations for and that I feel tries very hard to match the success of studios previous game (Pillars of Eternity) but just falls short due to some bad design decisions. Which is a shame as it’s a great game to play, it has a great premiere that starts to lose steam for the middle part and then ends suddenly leaving you feeling like that you have missed something very important along the way. I’m not sure if it was planned to end like POE (that future expansions would continue the game’s story and flesh out more parts of the story) but it feels unfinished- even playing with the DLC Bastards wound.

Story wise, you are a Fatebinder of Kyros, overlord who has conquered majority of the known world. You act as his/her mouthpiece, and can issue Edicts, magic spells that effect an entire region. After an uprising occurs in a previous captured area and the 2 armies that are sent to quell the rebellion stall and fail due to infighting you are sent in to fix the mess or die trying, knowing that if you fail you will die as well as everyone in that region. Your overlord is evil, the armies fighting the war are different styles of evil and all your choices are bad. It’s a great idea -the closest comparison I can make is Blackguards (and that is more of a you and your party are selfish and immoral and the world around you is uncaring). It’s a great idea that’s done very well throughout the game. The worlds background and story is very well done- it’s a shame there isn’t more to learn as it’s a very interesting setting.

A highlight of the game is the initial conquest- you are given choices to make for each of the areas you select that either gains favour or wrath with one or both of the armies and the pre-existing defenders and villagers that live in the area. Each options changes how individuals interact with you, and can change which towns you can visit and quests available. More games need to do something like this. Another highlight of the game is the magic system, you find different cores (fire, ice ect), change its usage (bolt, touch ect) and finally accents that add effects (like spell penetration, cooldown ect). All of the above require different amounts of lore to use, so characters that focus on raising lore can cast more damaging spells. It’s a well-designed system that doesn’t just favour maxing stats. Making the character have to use abilities in combat to improve them is also another great idea- the characters grow during the game, and if you don’t like what you have initially created you can evolve them into something else (at least until you purchase the ability to respec your character)

The game gives you 4 paths, all of which change what side missions you can do and the quests available. You can follow the horde like chorus (which my first impression was wow these guys are sadistic evil in their methods), the elite disfavoured army (which immediately looks like the lesser of two evils) but as you play them you realise you are supporting a racist bigot and his followers, you can decide following either of the armies is for chumps and breakout on your own, or decide to re-instate the ineffective rebels who couldn’t put aside their differences in the beginning and allowed themselves to be steamrolled before the game starts.

The first area highlights the best parts of the game, with your decisions being thrown back in your face as both army’s squabble over who is going to attack and your previous choices starting to come back to haunt you. You are under pressure as you have a time limit to finish your task or everyone dies. It’s very well done. I feel Act 2 starts to fall apart. Instead of keeping the pressure on the game relaxes here, which I thought was a mistake. Majority of the game falls under act 2, and you have options of where you are going to go (you can’t solve all the problems as you can only do the major questlines of 3 out of 4 areas). If you were still forced to get the tasks done within a time limit I think it would have really pushed the pacing of the game, and I think making you live with your bad choices would have been great. Act 3 comes and goes really quickly, which is surprising. At this point it feels rushed, and it seems like there was a lot more content that was planned that was either cut or never made it into the game.

I’ll give credit that the decision to not have an end boss (or being able to talk the end boss down or change who the end boss is) is a not something you see very often (I can only think of it being in Blackguards or the widely loved Planescape:Torment)

Your companions are an interesting bunch, but for the life of me I can’t understand why you would force users to purchase DLC to flesh out quests for them. And when doing that, only offer quests for 3 out of 6 companions leaving the other 3 with minimal development. I can’t understand the design logic behind it, they are an integral part of the game – it would be like only providing the voice files for half of the party. If you purchase the short stories (which were a quick but fun read) adds more background to each of the major players in the game but the characters should be fleshed out enough in game for you to care about them.

The game looks amazing at 4K, with the blasted landscapes, ruined villages and debris from old battles littering maps. Spell effects looks good, and combat animation is great (again with the idea of being evil with a lot of enemies you don’t just simply kill them, you can gib them into oblivion). The music fits the game wonderfully, however its weird that only some parts of dialogue with companions and enemies are voiced- this makes the game feel disjointed. Maybe I’ve been spoilt with previous games like Dragonage and Baldur’s gate but it’s something I now expect.

The DLC is hit and miss. Bastards wounds adds some companion quests (which in this type of game should have been there from the start), another area with its own problems to sort out (credit where credit is due here- you can roleplay following orders and put every man women and child to the sword for breaking the law). It also gives you a 5th ending where you stay loyal- again another thing that was missing from the base game that’s shouldn’t have been. I haven’t tried the extra encounters DLC, as it didn’t seem worth the price (in the game these are either merchants you run into, and additional fight or a buff to your party before moving into the next area on the map). The upgraded editions are the collector’s editions extras and not needed to play the game, but add extras if you want to pay. As mentioned the short stories compilation were good, but over too quickly. If ringtones and music OST’s are your thing then you are covered. The artbook is good, the guidebook covers a vast amount of lore and background- some that you can find in the game.

If you are chasing 100% achievements then it is possible, but be prepared to do at least 4 runs through the game.

If you like real-time party based RPG’s (think Planescape: Torment or Baldur’s Gate) then you should give Pillars of Eternity a go. Being a spiritual successor to these games (it isn’t set in a Dungeons and Dragons universe or use its any of its rulesets) the game play very much like the above-mentioned games, but with a few tweaks here and there, that mostly work in its favor. I think majority of the time it captures what made those games great (heavily story driven, interesting world, overarching plot that hooks you, party members who all have varying goals in your struggle, a stronghold to look after), while somehow missing the something that made it WOW (I can’t put my finger on it- the game is great, but just didn’t seem to fill me with any sense of urgency to do the main quest no matter how good the plot is.) I found I didn’t really understand some of the classes you pick very well, and some of the game mechanics weren’t explained well (or were easily forgotten- that made things harder than they should be)

I won’t spoil the plot (because the plot is very good and does raise some interesting questions with some big twists at the end) but you are exposed to a ritual that awakens your soul so that two major changes happen to you- you can see all your past lives, and you can now read other people’s souls and follows your quest to try and undo this change (as it will eventually drive your character insane). This continues in the 2 DLC that are available – I would recommend both of these as well as they continue the story so well. As mentioned the world building is amazing and your actions will affect not only what happens to a town/area, but your party members as well and other major players, giving you a sense of purpose in the world. As in many situations the road to hell is paved with good intentions, playing as a relatively good character completely screwed me in some area’s (plot wise)- you can’t help everyone no matter how hard you try, and everyone suffers if you try.

There are plenty of areas to explore, quests to do, and I did like that XP was only given for finishing quests. This made sneaking past things worthwhile, or talking your way out of a valid option (typically I sweep an entire map before moving on). My only gripe is that having so much to explore drags you away from the main story, it got to a point where I couldn’t remember what was happening in the main story as I was finishing up side quests. There is so much that explains the world\local events so well but the main events aren’t really mentioned (the older D&D games always refresh your memory whenever you can to impart that sense of urgency- even if there is no in game urgency). I did like that instead of having a party reputation that is always applied to you, its applied to the area you are in, so if you help this town the next one might be upset with you for denying them income ect. It made resolving events and interesting choice between doing what I think I should do to thinking how is this going to help me.

You party members shine in this game (maybe not quite as well as the above-mentioned games, but very close), and all have their own goals for traveling with you. They bicker and argue amongst themselves, one thing I’m not sure of is there is a way to make them leave your party (like in Baldur’s Gate if your reputation gets outside the range they like or you say something they didn’t like). Their personnel quests were great, and complimented the characters well- I don’t think there was one quest that didn’t suit the character.

The voicework for the characters is very well done, and with the game being very dark Hiravias rude nature and jokes were one of the only thing that I found that lightened the setting (no matter how wrong they are). The music score is great- it’s what you expect for a game of this caliber.

If you are chasing achievements then unless you backed the game it’s impossible- there is an award for backing the game. I don’t know why you have something like this- I find it off-putting (but then again, I care for going for 100%). I can’t imagine doing the game solo on hardcore on the hardest difficulty, there are plenty of fights in the game (dragons fights) that took me plenty of tries to even get close with and that was with a full party. The ending for the main game and the second DLC were wow, with the ending for the first DLC being a placeholder for the second.

If you purchase any of the higher Teir packages of the game then the artbook, campaign almanac and novella are worth it- they are great reads and do help expand the background story (or helps condense it into one neat section for you to read). I am looking forward to seeing how the choices I made in this game are carried over to Pillars of Eternity: Deadfire and what the fallout is going to be.

Punch club is a boxing/time management sim, with a fair dose of nostalgia from the 80’s thrown in for good measure. It references Rocky, Bloodfist, Ninja Turtles, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter as well as Terminator to name a few, and actually references them quite well. I’m not sure if it follows all the laws of time travel (my head is still reeling from the twist that’s dropped on you at the end), but it’s a fun to slowly punch your way to the top.

Gameplay is pretty straightforward, you can explore your neighborhood (something leading to more fights or events), train/fight or do the necessary tasks (eat, sleep, work) to enable the first two activities. This game is based around a tight management schedule of maintaining high levels of food, moral, and energy, while trying to train in the required stat (strength, agility or endurance). All these values decrease over time unless certain upgrades are purchased, which stop them decreasing under a certain value. As with most things in life, generalizing in this game will get you nowhere. You need to pick a stat and follow the fighting style that associated with it to the end. While one or two points in the other stats won’t be a deal breaker, too much will directly affect your fighting ability- too much strength when using a different style will result in you running out of energy during a fight (as damage and energy usage is directly multiplied by the strength stat). This follows true for most of the 3 styles that you can pick, but to differing degrees. Unless you really go wrong then the hardest part is picking which moves to use in each fight, as the styles play largely like a harder version of rock scissors paper, with a few twists.

Story wise, the game is broken up into 3 or 4 arcs, with it following your early days (minor boxing league), the 2nd arc of either participating in a major boxing league or finishing all the underground fight clubs, and depending on which one is finished first, the 3rd arc depending on your previous choice (either fighting in Russia or fighting in prison), with the finial arc you fighting on the island to confront your father’s killer. The game is filled with pop references to boxing/fighting legends and the music suits this game very well- it’s also sounds like the 16 bit music that games had in the 80’s.

I found most of the side quests to be very humorous, and all fights are welcome as you want the XP from them you upgrade your moves. The only time this isn’t the case is for major fights as a loss can drop you on the ranking quite a bit- though this isn’t as issue unless you are aiming to complete the game in under a set amount of in game days.

The game isn’t overly long- a few hours each night should see you finish it in a week or two, unless you start hunting down everything or really go wrong (like run out of money and start losing fights).

If you are chasing 100% achievements then it’s possible, but expect a few runs through the game as you will have to do both paths and finish it in a under 100 game days.

I would recommend getting the OST and art book- for the cost the music is good and the artbook provides an interesting look at how the game has developed.

Do you want to make everything explode? Do you like strapping soldiers to gas canisters and shooting them into space? Do you like riding nuclear missiles into the sunset? If you answered yes to any of the above then you should play Just Cause 3.

Continuing Rico’s mission to liberate countries that are run under a dictatorship, Rico returns to his home country of Medici to free it and discovery how events came to pass and his role in them.

Just Cause 3 gameplay is very much an updated copy of Just Cause 2- it’s an open world 3rd person shooter where nearly everything is filled with explosives and nearly everything can be grappled together to destroy structures and explode. Nearly everything that is a mission objective is marked in either red or white, which when you are constantly flying, driving, running around makes it very easy to see where you need to go. As mentioned nearly everything explodes (even the civilian cars you are trying to rescue), which attracts military attention quickly, guaranteeing there will be a fire fight following soon. This is fun for the first 20 hours, then you find the action of constant firefights starts to wear on you. I never thought I would get bored of having things explode but by the end was wishing for a stealth section to bypass some of the fights. Luckily there are plenty of other things to do and collect to break up the constant action. Each type of collectable unlocks something, from weapons, vehicles, to free parachuting in a region for quick travel. This can save a fair chunk of time, as many of the missions are spread far apart, and it can take quite some time to get there (even if you do fly a fighter jet there its quicker to do a quick jump). There are cars/boats/planes to hijack (to unlock as a quick drop), and plenty if challenges to unlock upgrades. If you do die then you don’t lose any progress -it’s always nice to be able to relax as you reduce a military installation to rubble.

A big part of the game is how you move around it. Gliding around with the Wingsuit is amazing and the world is wonderfully built, with valleys, forests and mountains to take in (when you’re not being shot at). I felt driving was the same as Just Cause 2, which wasn’t as responsive as I would like and for the majority of it I didn’t find it enjoyable. That said the racecar was good to drive (it might be the speed that car got too- you fly across the map with it). The tanks were good fun (and if you aren’t driving/flying an attack helicopter or Mech then it was one of the better choices for starting the base liberating missions). The helicopters were my choice of vehicle when not using the wingsuit, purely for the speed and maneuverability of going anywhere. I didn’t find the boats too useful (the dlc boat is a different story).

Graphicly the game looks amazing- I wasn’t running with the best video card or the highest settings but it ran smooth, I didn’t see any noticeable visual glitches and it looks amazing. There are plenty of audio logs that fill in the backstory- and by collecting them you realize that Rico isn’t just liberating his home country, he is fixing his past. I found the voice acting is well done, and Rico isn’t just a smooth-talking Steven Seagal knock off with a dodgy American CIA operative friend anymore.

My biggest gripe would be being forced to do the challenges to unlock upgrades on your tech tree- some upgrades are critical to make the gameplay fun (max grapple strength, any of the wingsuit upgrades), and you are forced to get 1-3 stars, and come back later for the final elusive 5-star rating. They do teach the mechanics that will make sure you get the most out of the game, but it’s frustrating to be forced to do. That said you could ignore the upgrades, but you miss out on much of what makes the game fun (and everything is much slower without the upgrades). After a while the gameplay becomes repetitive, I’m not sure if I played too much of it too quickly, but it does start to seem like it has worn out its welcome. I felt burnt out playing the DLC (the DLC is fun and can be started within the main plot of the game), but I think maybe the main story just took a little too long to complete, which lead to the disinterest in the game by the end.

Each of the 3 DLC’s focuses on a new threat to Medici- and eventually leads you to getting a new Boat (which is good), 2 land Mechs (one which would be my main land vehicle going forward), and a rocket powered wingsuit (which you should start the DLC just to get- it’s amazing). I must admit the Air DLC final battle is amazing, with you flying around a giant Airship slowing disabling it as it spews out drones to try and stop you. I don’t think I’ve had has much fun in a boss battle for a long time.

If you are chasing 100% achievements then it’s possible but be prepared to practice the challenges, some of them are very hard and require multiple visits and attempts until you understand how to do it.