Blunt Showdown🌿🚬

No hate for FTL, they deserved my money. But I like this game way more than FTL, I'm a little obsessed. I got the notification about the latest update and had a little celebration.

Dunno what they did to the physics and damage calculation, but the passable system they had is now abysmal. I cleave my axe deep into Willie's arm and it's still perfectly functional, then I make a light backswing into Willie's torso and he gets cut in half, then as soon as the next round starts Willie's falchion bounces off my helmet and still manages to cut me in half from my collarbone to my groin. Damage is so inconsistent that half my deaths feel unfair because a lucky hit turned my thigh into pasta sauce and half my kills feel unfair, because it really isn't that easy to cut someone in half but most of the time I do it by accident.

And all that's a real shame too, because I was CRAZY about the earlier demo, I loved it! But I can hardly play the game for ten minutes anymore because winning by accident isn't fun and losing to the physics engine is unfair.

Darkest Dungeon is one of those games that I want to like SO BAD. But I've played this game for 140 hours, and I've never finished it. I just can't make it all the way through. And the problem: RNG. Now I'm familiar with playing around probabilities, minimizing risk, having backup plans, etc. But just because I can usually manage the RNG doesn't make the moments where it really screws you any more fun. Because that's the problem--there is SO MUCH RNG that there is no way to mitigate it all. Turn order is random, accuracy is random, damage is random, dodge is random, crits are random, death blows are random, stress causing virtues and afflictions is random, debuffs are random, encounters are random, curios have random effects, loot is random, healing is random, when you need to eat is random, if you get ambushed when you sleep is random, its just random random random random!

The last time I quit the game I had an occultist I really liked with a high level party, and we got into a surprise battle with some spiders. And the spiders got high speed rolls and all moved first, they all randomly decided to attack the occultist, they all hit, they blighted, and then before I could get a turn in the blight won the random deathblow chance and killed him. Sure it was tragic and dramatic and fit the narrative of the setting, but it also sucked because it was completely unfair and took away all player agency. That's what RNG does, it replaces well-designed systems that the player can influence with games of chance that take agency away from the player.

So this game is great if you are interested in gambling with the quality of your entertainment, it can be super fun! It can suck! Who knows what will happen! But it could have just been consistently fun if the developers hadn't chosen to include as many RNG systems as they could.

Damn good horror game, scary enough I don't want to play it though.

Yeah I know I barely played this game, but that's because it failed horribly with it's hook.
First of all, I don't think there really is a story? You just kinda get teleported to the wizard world and are told to do the chaos trials, so you do them. Maybe there is actually some sort of narrative later on, but it's really strange for the first few runs of the game to feel like you're just doing them because the game is about doing runs.

Next problem I ran into was the terrain, there's just random "platforming" (random holes in the floor for you to jump over) to do as you wander the map, but if you screw it up you lose health. You don't get anything for succeeding, and it's really not difficult, you just have to use your dash when you're right on the edge so you make it all the way across. But it slows you down and punishes you for inattention when you're just moving around the map going back to a shop, which is pointless.

Finally, I quickly got tired of the enemies, because fighting them is just stressful. There are melee enemies that follow you like a dog the whole time, never providing a moment to breathe. Archers that are constantly aiming at you with their laser-pointers getting ready to fire, with no cooldown in between attacks. It makes combat harder sure, but mostly because I can't ever stop to think, instead relying on my reactions or practiced movements and combos to get through fights. And when I get hit, it almost feels unfair because my enemies spam attacks with no cooldown meanwhile I have to deal with agonizingly long cooldowns on my "standard" spell slot, relying instead on spamming melee range basic attacks that put me at serious risk because of how aggressive enemies are. There's just constant pressure to maneuver and attack perfectly, but no time to figure out how to do that on the fly. So my first few runs were just dying over and over immediately without accomplishing anything. It wasn't rewarding or fun at all.

If you wouldn't mind dealing with that stuff, then maybe this game is for you. But I just can't wrap my head around those design decisions. Why include the chore of easy parkour that punishes failure? Why have basically no story? Why make enemies put on so much pressure that I struggle to think tactically? Maybe that one's just a me problem, but I still don't like it. This game's probably a 3/10 from me, do not recommend.

If you look at these reviews you'll hear that the story is terrible, gameplay is great, game is short. I don't know how short the game is, I haven't finished it and I never will. That's because superhot has one good thing - stopping time when you stand still. And everything else is bad. The gunplay is bad, level design is mediocre, enemy variety and weapon variety are terrible, controls are poor (things like no crouch button, no fast time button), sound design is terrible (I enjoyed it more playing without sound), the graphics are terrible (red dudes and white walls get old fast), even the replays, which could be fun to watch after a level, are covered in SUPER HOT in giant letters so you can hardly see what's going on, and there's just this voice saying super, hot over and over so you ca't properly listen to the action. Why? Hearing repetitive noises and not being able to see the screen isn't fun!

So basically, this is more of a tech demo than a game. It's not just too short, it's unfinished. They completed a single good mechanic and said yup, that'll carry the entire game. That's all we need to do. Twenty five dollars please.

I want to like this game, but I swear, playing this makes me more angry than playing League of Legends. I'm currently debating whether or not to rage quit the finale. Who cares about the sunk cost I can have more fun playing literally anything else at this point.

Designing airships is fun, there are plenty of mods, and the real beauty is the campaign.
It's stripped down to reduce management so you get to focus on design, combat, and fleet positioning. Pure tactics with none of the fluff.