Reaver
01-28-2009, 03:09 PM
For no particular reason, I am reviewing a few games/demos.
F.E.A.R 2 demo: Never played the first game. This demo was ok. Some fun weapons, but the cover system seems mostly useless since you can't lean or peer around objects to reduce exposure.
At least for the demo, the levels seem very cramped and linear. This also makes the game a lot less challenging as the enemies are just about fish in a barrel. Didn't see any cover fire/advance, flanking or any tactics really except for running out of doorways into a cascade of rifle fire. Boring A.I. from what the demo presents.
Ghosts things were annoying but there was one part that startled me. This demo was pretty "eh" for me until I got the the POWER ARMOR!! Fuck yeah! Otherwise, I wasn't much impressed by the game. I'll buy it when it's 15 bucks on Steam.
DoW 2 Beta: Since there seems to be no offline way to learn the units and their abilities/counters, I already hate this game. Yeah, that's fun to try to figure out what does what while someone else beats the hell out of you.
I've read that this game is more tactics (Ground Control) than build orders so I'm still interested. Guess I'll wait for a proper demo (i.e. single player) to come out.
DoW:SoulStorm: Why do I keep buying rts'es?? I just don't have the patience to play these stupid games with the ridiculous amout of micromanaging they require. I always get pissed off playing these things. Here's the problem. The units and effects/animations entertain me so I like fooling around for the first few hours. But the same thing happens every time too. Eventually, the only way to win is to build a bunch of the one unit that crushes everything and just roll over the enemy without the need for even the slightest bit of tactics.
I get irritated waiting for buildings to build and resources to fill and research to complete and blah blah. Just gimme my fucking troops so I can go all Patton on the enemy's ass. I want the gameplay of a Close Combat with the production values of a CoH or DoW.
Ok, so this was less of a review and more of a rant. I still kinda enjoy DoW:SS even though I wish it was the kind of game I want to play. I know, I'm weird.
Mount and Blade: Ok, this game is the surprise of the year. This is one of the reasons I love Steam. Games I never would have bought at the store or even looked at twice turn out to be awesome. Hell, I never even heard of this one before. But there it was. On sale for 7.50 and it is very engrossing and has tremendous depth. It's extremely unique and the combat is fun. When was the last time you fought on horseback with bow and arrow or sword and shield? This game is the definition of epic gaming. It has the RPG elements of skill and character building with the combat of FPS, so your stats affect battle but you still control the fight with your own skill.
You start out as one man (or woman) and eventually you can hire a few others to form a party. You can progress to leading an army of hundreds with archers, pikemen, calvary and lay siege to castles. There are other career paths like trader, but i haven't had a chance to play those yet. So far I am very impressed with this game.
Luxor: Quest for the Afterlife: Enjoyable casual game in the style of Zuma. Match colored marbles to destroy them before they reach the end of the path. This game isn't as challenging as Zuma. Different colors have different powers like Zuma, but with Luxor, you can control when you get power ups with every 3rd consecutive match. Luxor looks really good and the voice acting sounds great.
Zuma can be infuriating, but it had better and more creative level design. It was way more satisfying to beat. The one thing Luxor has over Zuma is that it keeps getting new games. Still waiting for Zuma 2! =(
That's all for now...
F.E.A.R 2 demo: Never played the first game. This demo was ok. Some fun weapons, but the cover system seems mostly useless since you can't lean or peer around objects to reduce exposure.
At least for the demo, the levels seem very cramped and linear. This also makes the game a lot less challenging as the enemies are just about fish in a barrel. Didn't see any cover fire/advance, flanking or any tactics really except for running out of doorways into a cascade of rifle fire. Boring A.I. from what the demo presents.
Ghosts things were annoying but there was one part that startled me. This demo was pretty "eh" for me until I got the the POWER ARMOR!! Fuck yeah! Otherwise, I wasn't much impressed by the game. I'll buy it when it's 15 bucks on Steam.
DoW 2 Beta: Since there seems to be no offline way to learn the units and their abilities/counters, I already hate this game. Yeah, that's fun to try to figure out what does what while someone else beats the hell out of you.
I've read that this game is more tactics (Ground Control) than build orders so I'm still interested. Guess I'll wait for a proper demo (i.e. single player) to come out.
DoW:SoulStorm: Why do I keep buying rts'es?? I just don't have the patience to play these stupid games with the ridiculous amout of micromanaging they require. I always get pissed off playing these things. Here's the problem. The units and effects/animations entertain me so I like fooling around for the first few hours. But the same thing happens every time too. Eventually, the only way to win is to build a bunch of the one unit that crushes everything and just roll over the enemy without the need for even the slightest bit of tactics.
I get irritated waiting for buildings to build and resources to fill and research to complete and blah blah. Just gimme my fucking troops so I can go all Patton on the enemy's ass. I want the gameplay of a Close Combat with the production values of a CoH or DoW.
Ok, so this was less of a review and more of a rant. I still kinda enjoy DoW:SS even though I wish it was the kind of game I want to play. I know, I'm weird.
Mount and Blade: Ok, this game is the surprise of the year. This is one of the reasons I love Steam. Games I never would have bought at the store or even looked at twice turn out to be awesome. Hell, I never even heard of this one before. But there it was. On sale for 7.50 and it is very engrossing and has tremendous depth. It's extremely unique and the combat is fun. When was the last time you fought on horseback with bow and arrow or sword and shield? This game is the definition of epic gaming. It has the RPG elements of skill and character building with the combat of FPS, so your stats affect battle but you still control the fight with your own skill.
You start out as one man (or woman) and eventually you can hire a few others to form a party. You can progress to leading an army of hundreds with archers, pikemen, calvary and lay siege to castles. There are other career paths like trader, but i haven't had a chance to play those yet. So far I am very impressed with this game.
Luxor: Quest for the Afterlife: Enjoyable casual game in the style of Zuma. Match colored marbles to destroy them before they reach the end of the path. This game isn't as challenging as Zuma. Different colors have different powers like Zuma, but with Luxor, you can control when you get power ups with every 3rd consecutive match. Luxor looks really good and the voice acting sounds great.
Zuma can be infuriating, but it had better and more creative level design. It was way more satisfying to beat. The one thing Luxor has over Zuma is that it keeps getting new games. Still waiting for Zuma 2! =(
That's all for now...