Recent reviews by Alice

I know SONY gets a lot of hate but personally I don't think it gets enough

Game won't even start. My drivers are up to date and I also tried what everyone has been suggesting by going to windows defender yada yada.

This game felt like a fresh breath of air so it's really sad to see it go like this. I can ignore the game breaking issues since I've been having so much fun with this game, but I draw the line at the PSN account.

I bought this game on Steam with the intention of playing it on Steam. I don't own a PlayStation, so why should I have to sign up for an account just to get my data sold. If it's cross play and I don't conform with the new account requirement, then let me just only be able to play with other PC users.

Forcing players to link their account with PSN or banning them from the game just because they used VPN to follow the rules months after launch is unacceptable. The whole "protecting our players" nonsense doesn't really fly when it involves a company like Sony that has a data breach or a hacking event every other year. Especially when those events have hundreds of thousands of users, accounts and information stolen or corrupted.

For anyone linking their account, I would strongly advise even if it may be obvious, to not use the same password as your other apps when creating a PSN account. That opens you up to a Sony server breach making your password public and people using it to log into your other accounts. Sony had multiple breaches in the last couple of years so their IT security is horrendous.

Godspeed Helldivers, may we cross paths again in the future and spread some Democracy together again.

Let me start off by saying, don't get discouraged by the negative reviews. Some of them point out the fact that the game is way too difficult especially in the beginning, not mentioning that you can a) change the game's difficulty, and b) the game has a soulslike tag, and by now pretty much everyone knows that soulslike = hard game. The others are complaining that the game is too bland, doesn't have amazing graphics and the story is weak.

Out of curiosity I checked out the Developer and browsed through their other games and observed that the other games they made are "hidden object", "puzzle", "point and click" etc having those 2010 graphics we've been accustomed with for that genre of game. Why did I feel the need to say all this? Because what they did with Scars Above is an IMPRESSIVE "upgrade". It's a completely different game and genre than what they are used to making and that alone is spectacular.

It's also good to note that the difficulty could be related to the fact that Kate, the character you're playing as, is an astronaut and a scientist – not a soldier - something that is said several times throughout the game. You wouldn't expect a scientist to pull a John Wick, right? BUT because of this, she's resourceful and determined to do anything to survive.

Fighting wise, you have ranged weapons, melee attacks, devices and consumables. You craft different kinds of weapons throughout the game and you can switch through them at any given point. You use a combination of elemental attacks, a lot of gadgets and items with different functionalities that only enrich your game play. You can exploit the environment and enemy weaknesses by scanning them and gaining valuable information. Exploiting the weak points of your foes makes the fighting even easier and helps you to discover effective tactics against them. Kate, once again, is a scientist so with her help you can extract information from your surroundings by scanning artifacts, materials and creatures in order to learn about their features, properties and weaknesses. That, of course, if you actually check out the journal and don't get bored by reading the available information.

The game has gorgeous landscapes and good graphics, I often found myself slow walking and taking in the scenery.
The story is also interesting enough to keep you playing the game and questioning what is so special about you, a simple scientist, that you're pretty much humanity's last chance.

And, as a bonus for people that like to hunt achievements, this is an easy 100% that can be done in one play-through.

what post nut clarity feels like

Larian is the true Absolute, we're all infected but have no prism that's why we can't stop playing the game

I need to start off by saying that Firewatch has one of the most phenomenal voice acting. You can feel all the emotions the characters are experiencing just listening to their voices.

The game's intro is exceptionally well done in terms of getting you to know your character better, experience a personal tragic love story of a man who wants to make peace and understanding his decision, as well as making you get attached to him in the first five minutes of the gameplay since you choose how his life turns out (to a point).

The gameplay is essentially roaming through a beautiful national park, taking in the view while also following your boss's orders to make sure no one is burning the place down. The only other person you can talk with is actually your boss, a special lady that has her emotions scattered everywhere. The two of you communicate via a walkie-talkie, selecting the dialogue according to the situation.

The story takes a dark turn eventually and you find out that things aren't always what they look like.

this game feels like a fever dream

This game is harder than Dark Souls

Let me start off by saying that Thymesia has a lot of potential, but unfortunately it feels like that potential is being ripped away from the game.

Although Thymesia is more of a Hack and Slash game than a Souls-Like, for unexperienced players the game can still be a little bit of a challenge.

Thymesia encourages an aggressive playstyle, focused more on parry than on the dodge mechanic. The game also has LITTLE to no staggering to some enemies and bosses, but that doesn't make the game more difficult, it just means the player has to be patient and not spam the attacks.

Thymesia has a different approach to "Souls-Like" games, you have only 2 main weapons, a saber with which you attack, a dagger that you parry the attacks with and a default armor model. To make up for this, the game offers a variety of Plague Weapons and Talents to play and experience with.
Talent points are awarded to the player when leveling up (up to 25 points) and Plague Weapons are unlocked after collecting Skill Shards from the enemies.
The game sure has an interesting assortment of Talents, but they become redundant early and if you want a "challenging" experience you might as well play with two Talents maximum.
The same goes for the Plague Weapons, the game is already fairly easy which makes it feel like you're cheating when trying to use the Plague Weapons in fights, which is really a shame because there are a lot of interesting Plague Weapons. Each Plague Weapon also has extended actions that gives the player a lot of new bonuses, but in order to unlock the extended actions the player has to farm A LOT. Even with the Luck Talent LVL 3 the drop chance is still very little and the trouble seems worthless since nobody wants to spend hours grinding the same Plague Weapon when they could instead finish the game.

The Health Potion system offers the player 3 types of potions to use from. The potions can also be upgraded expanding the number of potions held (6 maximum), increasing the health regeneration and unlocking Ingredient slots to craft the potions.
The crafting system is entertaining, the player can play around with the Ingredients to try and guess the formulas, which are 8 in total and each one has its own advantage BUT the Ingredients can be a pain to farm, the drop rate is even lower than that of the Skill Shards and the player might not be able to unlock all the formulas in a single run.

The art design of the game overall is enjoyable but it can be seen that the game still needs to be polished.
The sound effects and ambient sounds are pleasant, the soundtrack is simply exquisite but the game is missing an important aspect to help the player get immersed, voice acting.

The game offers the player 4 main levels and quests, the first 3 having sub-levels and side quests and a total of 9 bosses.
The side quests are just the recycled main quests and they are genuinely boring.
The bosses are fairly weak and can be defeated in less than 2 minutes, offering the player nothing but regret for not being challenging.

The pricing of the game is relatively high for the hours of content it offers. It takes 3 hours to finish the game and a little over 6 to 100% it.

Last but not least, the game is relatively full of bugs.
Some of them are minors: assets clipping through other assets, roomings, typos, draw distance issues, z-fightings; but most of them are MAJOR. Settings are not saved, there are random frame drops (I have a RTX 3060TI), enemies can be seen in an idle state in all of the levels even when approaching them, a lot of enemies, elite enemies and bosses become unresponsive when fighting them, the player's attacks are going through the enemies and bosses dealing no damage, Corvus can remain stuck in various places, using the Step and Jump Talent often results in either getting stuck in the air or the game losing functionality (ex: Corvus moves in a single direction on its own and cannot be controlled, enemies' attacks are going through Corvus and vice versa) and the only workaround is to quit to the Main Menu and load again the save.

Still, Thymesia is an interesting concept of a Hack and Slash (I really cannot call it a Souls-Like) game with a lot of potential that still has a long way to go and shouldn't have been released in its current state.

I can fix her