Recent reviews by Gigdam

To put this review into context: this is my first full completion of a tomb raider game, ever. I have played a bit of anniversary on the wii though.

Lara Croft 2013 is a game set on a island of folklore and legend. You follow the story of the titular character who is an archaeologist, and her quest of discovery slowly changing from a story of discovery to an action-adventure of survival

This reboot series of Tomb raider is more of an uncharted game than a classic TR game with its set pieces, but the collectibles and secret tomb side of this game mercifully gives it its own identity. So if you do not like the Uncharted style of things, then this (I can imagine Rise and Shadow too) are not for you, but because I did like Uncharted 2, I LOVED this. Please scroll to the bad section if you play this game without vsync

The good:
I really enjoyed the scripted sections, going through them and seeing the world flashily get destroyed around Lara whilst keeping her alive. None of the pieces felt like I was wasting my time viewing them, and I enjoyed the ramifications of those set pieces on the whole character roster.

Whilst for me the puzzles of the tombs weren't these multi-room labyrinths like they were in prior TR games, I did enjoy the change in pace they provided to the rest of the game. They do stick out a bit on their own island when compared to the action, collectables and set pieces. But I'd say them being this way is the best direction the devs could've gone with it. I loved the identity and lore bits these puzzles gave to the game, and the change of pace they provide to the rest of the game without being overbearing and exhausting, compared to the rest of the game. Just some nice wind down puzzle sections.

The open areas in this game, after the set pieces, are fantastic. They provide you with well designed exploration and reasons to backtrack once you've upgraded your ♥♥♥♥. One nitpick I have with the exploration section of the game is that that bonus collectables aren't mentioned before or (an even worse sin) after you've collected them, which means if you are a completionist, it's annoying to find this again (The other thing I didn't like about this is mentioned in the meh section). But otherwise, these areas are designed a bit like jungle gyms, and I never felt bored traversing through them, even on multiple passes.

Whilst I am more of a mechanics gamer rather than a narrative gamer, the story ended up being pretty good. I liked how there were consequences for quite a few characters, and you didn't know what was going to happen to all of the different characters. Some of the events were a bit wacky, but this is a story involving myths and legends, so I wasn't surprised about the wackiness. I enjoyed the resolution of the story too, and it felt well deserved. You get a really good sense that Lara grew during this journey.

I loved the weapon design and mods you get throughout the game, as you are a shipwrecked survivor, so your toolkit reflects it. It's dirty, makeshift, often times imprecise and on its last legs. Thankfully they didn't give you anything brand spanking new in the game right at the beginning, and the weapons reflect the upgrades you've done to them in their visual design (the upgrades felt unique enough to warrant change in look). I won't spoil all the weapons you get (I do spoil one later), but all of them look and feel unique to use (and also you aren't just holding 2 weapons at a time, thank goodness)
I would've liked to spend more time with the last bow in the game, though. As that was the best one, but you had barely any time with it compared to the rest of the bows.
I also would've liked juuuust a bit more currency during the main game, because I was about 20% off of the final upgrade needed to max out all the weapons in the game in one run, but those are nitpicks, and I had fun regardless.

As mentioned, because of the upgrades giving you a physical change, I am glad to report they also give you a mechanical change as well, as weapons often times have alternative modes of fire that change either what or how they fire, rather than absolutely every upgrade being the bog standard stability, ROF and DMG upgrades you'd get in tonnes of other games. What makes this even better is that enemies will change what they say and do when then they get his with said modes of fire, so they don't feel completely braindead either.

The meh
The backtracking isn't in the meh section because it's a bad thing and I hate back tracking, but rather because the map isn't fully cohesive via the set pieces, and the game doesn't tell you where there are breaks in the map. So I often found myself forgetting if I needed to fast travel or if I could walk between 2 sections, making backtracking annoying. What I would've liked is an update to the game map after you've done a destructive set piece, making the connected and disconnected parts of the map obvious.

This next one is going to be more a meh for some rather than a meh for me, but the weapon accuracy will definitely be a nit pick in this game. This is because some weapons make it nigh on impossible to headshot, whilst others are too slow to deal with all of the enemies on screen. But for me, I accepted it as a stylistic choice, as the weapons are supposed to be a bit run down and useless. So watch out with that aim of yours if it's bad, and don't be annoyed that you missed if it's good.

Sadly, this game is added to the list of games that have underwhelming shotguns. That sucks because the game does give you an alt fire later that makes it semi-useful. If all they did was swap that alt to main fire, then added a better alt fire, then it'd reach the okay range. But apart from achievements or opening up parts of the world, the shotgun sucks.

The bad
Now this is going to be the most nitpicky thing in the world, but this game has the vsync door bug. Thankfully, it isn't all the doors, but one specific slightly ajar door 4/5ths through the game. To fix it, what you have to do is re-enable vsync, and then once you've passed it, you can disable it again.
It isn't a big thing, and to to other people would put that in the meh section, but I hate this bug with a passion, and every time I see it (three times now in this game, Dead Space and Darkness 2) because I always freak out about not being able to fix it. I hope I never see it again. Hopefully the other games in the series don't have it as well, because I will return to this series in the future.

tl;dr very good game, good story, ♥♥♥♥ shotgun
10/10, had a blast, very solid 20hr game

For context of this review: I maxed out everything, played every day and night race (Except for the Mclaren DLC), did every speed trap, drift zone, billboard, flamingo capture etc. And got a very... nice number of hours out of the game on normal difficulty (using a mix of controller and steering wheel). I have played to completion 3 other NFS games (Most wanted 2012, The Run; Prostreet) but they were a few years ago.

I also bought it off a sale but my opinion wouldn't change if I had bought it full price

Lastly this is a racing game, and racing games aren't in the best spot right now, so I am grading it on a racing game scale

This game is amazing. I love the art direction, especially how everything pops at night. When you are grip racing, the sense of speed is fantastic and kicks in very well around the 200kmh/125mph mark. Even at the lower speeds at the start of the game, the audio direction is so good that I didn't feel slow, So this isn't a game that I've ever really felt slow in

Going more into sound design, they deserve top marks. All the effects, except for some cars (which engines I didn't like) feel really punchy. Everything racer and cop wise are very well marked out, and I hardly ever felt like I was cheated out of a telegraphed attack or moment. Just the spike strips are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, and they don't have a sound except sometimes a radio callout.Future person making a racing game: if they had some additional sounds or visuals then that'd be very nice

As mentioned before, I haven't played many NFS games (my last driving game outside of NFS was FH5 though), but I was very happy with the customisation options. Most cars have numerous visual options (thanks licensing for probably limiting others) that make a deep enough difference to feel satisfying (no scenario where you have 3 bumper options and the only thing that changes are the headlights). I also wasn't expecting the exhaust sounds to be custom, so for the most part you can tune out any annoyances you have with engines.

Finally, another thing I really liked about NFS was the map. Whilst it isn't super varied in terms of visuals, it is however excellently designed, so for example the Miami docks have parts that you can jump to gain rep, annoy cops, or both. And you can drive over these parts over and over again, finding new routes as you do. Corners elsewhere feel like you are properly grounded to the road and not skating on ice, so you are unlikely to unfairly lose time. Additionally, the game runs really smooth, I was easily capped at 144fps on a 6900XT/R9 3900X/ 32gb RAM setup (overkill I know) with no crashes and not causing my room to turn into a volcano



Prepare for the ramp up in speed with high heat races, they are no joke and will kick your ass the first time you unlock them, so prepare to grind for those ultimate+ upgrades. I went and grinded the fastest car in the game (the Regera) with the Corvette and enjoyed it, but if grind isn't for you, then I recommend getting Nexus mods that increase your returns (Don't play the game in online mode though when doing that)

The cops are also pretty divisive, as they ramp up in heat level very quickly and stay there, meaning if you shake off the cops at level 5, then expect hell to come to you when you get re-caught. The game is also pretty aggressive with the Rhino spam. The good news about those units is they take out fellow officers, the bad news is they try to cause a head-on with you, so prepare to avoid them like the plague

The other bad things about the game is that when playing on wheel, I couldn't "feel" the steering in the default view, so I had to use bonnet view, which restricts how much I could see behind me and was far from ideal. Thankfully I do like cockpit view, but for someone who doesn't, I'd extensively test the overall "feel" of the game and suit it to you, otherwise you'll feel too disconnected from the car to drive fast.
There is also no cockpit view, so if that view is ideal for you, then RIP you won't find it here

Whilst visually, I did say that the game was good looking, that was only with tweaking with the Anti-Aliasing. Without it, or whilst on the wrong setting, the game looks grainy, so if your system cannot consistently run AA, then you are in for a bad time visually.

Another meh thing is the music, instead of listening in-game I suggest listening to a playlist containing all the songs on a music platform and add the songs you like to your collection, because I found some of the song choices to be pretty obnoxious (it's no Prostreet soundtrack)

Finally, the nitpick regarding this game is completed races icons are bound to the lower level race, so if you wanted to rely on the game map telling you what you have and haven't ran, you'd have to run the races twice if you weren't paying attention and wanted to look at the map, so instead I suggest using steam's built in notes system (praise Gaben) to track what you have and haven't done


The drifting in this game is definitely the most divisive part of this game, because vehicles that don't want to drift won't drift well, so you have to do a lot of testing and retesting to get vehicles to drift properly. If you don't like the process of testing, grinding and re-testing, then pick a vehicle out of a drifting guide and use that. Though even though you may do this, it still feels meh and weak

The controller buttons can't be customised in-game, and require steam's controller support to change. This is baffling design decision coming from a large studio (and likely indicates crunch). So if you buy this through any other storefront that isn't liked to steam, or if you don't add it to steam, then you are screwed, and it sucks

Lastly, drifting at night is abysmal, because basically the most effective way to do it is to grab a drift car, do a stage, and then reset the night. Because as I've mentioned, the drifting in this game is very car specific, and additionally you can't swap out parts at night once you have heat on you, which you will after each event.


tl:dr: 8/10 for me, but I can see a 7/10 for someone else after looking through the flaws. And I hope the devs or anyone else makes another game like this, that irons out some of its flaws better

Some light spoilers on the plot are below, but not anything you wouldn't be able to figure out quickly

By far the most important single player game I've played. Both so far and potentially in my entire life. Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice is a story driven third-person game that takes the role of a Celtic fighter coming home to see her love interest being sacrificed to Norse gods. With the rot taking away her life anyway, she decides to embark on a journey to bring her love interest back to life.

What makes this story important is the way that mental health is portrayed in the game, as Senua suffers from psychosis, so you'll near-constantly hear voices pinging from every direction. Sometimes they'll point things out for you you (As the case with combat) Sometimes they'll mock you (Like showing weakness), and sometimes they'll encourage you (Such as avoiding death). And it just gives what you do that extra pinch of meaning within the game, and it really gives the sense of this being a physical and mental fight for Senua. A sense that no other game I've played has provided.

It also helps that the game looks stunning, so prepare to take a tonne of screenshots and use them as your wallpaper. One minor thing, if being nitpicky, is some of the puzzles can be a tiny bit challenging (Especially a certain bridge) And you can get yourself into some moments in combat where you will end up dying if you don't camera switch often enough. But otherwise, it's a fantastic game and it gets a huge recommendation from me

10/10 would spiral a country into uncontrollable debt again because education didn't get specced out

White Phosporus changes a man immensely

Jesus, has it been that long? Oh well, I guess there's not much else to do, so I'll just keep popping hours into this

Get yourself a game that sucks you in so much that your hours surpass the current year.

Just one word is needed to sum up this game: phenomenal

A game that's supposed to take 450 seconds took an hour


Yeah, its that frustrating

If you hear that someone has completed a race without recieving damage, then they are almost certainly lying

Took roughly 7 hours to complete a match

10/10 best war simulator going