Really wonderful and unique game with a gorgeous and striking art style and interesting game mechanic. The stealth sections were entirely pointless tbh, and after a while I found myself getting a bit frustrated with the movements and the player character's agonizingly slow walk speed. It's a huge world with a lot of areas and plenty of backtracking, so walking around will be half of your play time, and the game does little to innovate on that aspect and it ends up feeling quite tiresome to watch your little guy walk through the same huge rooms over and over.

But, like I said, the art direction is immaculate and so is the music and ambience, so it's not a huge deal, and can be kind of meditative if you're into that sort of thing. Unfortunately I am an impatient gremlin and found myself sighing a lot. It is a taste thing, I suppose.

I do absolutely recommend it, though!

Fun and cute little game with a very unique and well-executed art style and overall polished presentation. The environment and character designs manage to combine cuteness and body horror/gore in a way that feels really elegant and cohesive, as opposed to edgelord art where someone just slaps blood and guts on Hello Kitty for shock value. It's very deliberate and artistic here. I'm genuinely impressed that the artists managed to pull this off.

Combat isn't quite as snappy as you think it should be, and the farming/simulation elements aren't quite as intuitive or addictive as these types of games usually go for, but both were fun enough that I had a good time with the game and would recommend it to others. I also really enjoyed the writing, what little there was, as the tone and style reminded me appropriately of old religious texts, which really added to the overall atmosphere.

My one complaint would be that while the combat/roguelike portions of the game serve the farming portion, it's not really a symbiotic relationship. I'd say the game leans more heavily toward the farming and development of your cult over the "crusades" (the combat sections), and while that makes sense in terms of the game's story, I don't think it would've taken away much from said story if certain cult upgrades helped you on your crusades, for example.

Yes, a bit of this does exist in the game already, but most of your combat upgrades come from collecting tarot cards and holding sermons, which doesn't necessarily have anything to do with your cult itself. Meanwhile, crusades focus almost entirely on gathering resources for your cult to bring back once you're done (and story missions). Because the game focuses more on you developing your cult, you will probably end up having fully upgraded it long before you reach the final boss/game's ending. A bit more balance in that regard would've gone a long way, methinks.

Overall, I'm very impressed with the presentation and art style, the music and sound design, and how rich the world feels despite the writing being somewhat minimal. Defo give this one a go if it seems like something you'd enjoy!

Probably the best non-horror horror games I've played. The way it captures the visceral terror of swimming out into the sea and not seeing the bottom of the ocean, not seeing anything at all, but hearing strange and alien sounds in the distance, coming from things you can't see but know could kill you? Pure adrenaline joy.

That terror loses most of its impact upon a replay, however I find that the atmosphere and world and just the feel of the gameplay instead just replace the terror with fun? Like, it's a beautiful world, you're swimming around it, there's a satisfying loop of exploration and crafting and survival, and you can even get creative with the base building stuff.

Even if you're not into those bits, playing it even once is definitely worth it just to be scared shitless a couple of times.

This is one of those games that could and probably will end up becoming a nostalgic favorite for a lot of people. I think it will easily become that for me.

Definitely give it a go. And if you're playing it for the first time, I'd recommend reading as many of the "codex" entries as you can, because most of the story plays out in text and audio logs. It's a very subtle presence and the game's events can feel a bit nonsensical if you don't bother to read the updates in the PDA and some other scan data. And yes, this is a survivial crafting game with an actual story and an actual ending. I think that really makes the experience feel focused and complete where a lot of other craft-em-ups can end up becoming stale if you just keep playing them. Subnautica doesn't outstay its welcome, and if you go back, you do it because you want to, not because you feel like you have to.

deep sigh

I don't know where to begin with this. I don't want to waste your time, dear reader, the same way this game wasted mine, but what I have to say can't be summarized, for my rage is eternal and my writer brain strong.

The game. Is. Too. Long. And unlike Odyssey, where you could at least find some joy in running around in pretty fields and hearing Kassandra say some cringey lines in a somehow charming way, here you'll be. Uh. Just sort of enduring a bunch of fuck-all for 70 hours as you watch Eivor get thrown around from plot point to plot point without any real personal investment aside from your brother sort of prodding you along. Beating you with the carrot and the stick, if you will.

Eivor (I played as female/canon Eivor, because I'm sexy and have nice, heavy balls) has a revenge quest to set her on her journey, but it's basically just the prologue? And it's over before the title drops? So after that you're just sort of along for the ride. Eivor literally doesn't find out why the fuck plot even happened to her at the end of one of the main questlines. Like, the main character doesn't know why they're there, they have to be dragged along to participate in the plot. One of the final quests is literally her brother leading her somewhere and Eivor going "um where are we going hahahaha I don't understand???"

Imagine that, for 70+ hours. Just fucking about in your typical, massive Ubisoft collectathon, doing shitty little sidequests to get shitty little points so you can level up and see shitty little main quest cutscenes, all while not really knowing why the fuck this story is being told to you to begin with. "Oh but there's lore and DLC that explains --" Shut up! If you expect me to put 70+ hours of my real human life into the main game, then you gotta make me care about it in some way, shape, or form! You can't shit out a 70+ hour campaign and then just go "Oh but ignore that, the REAL content is in the SIDE content." I mean you can. Clearly. Doesn't mean I have to like it. Or that I'll buy your shitty side content. Because if I don't care about the main character or their story, I won't care about any extensions for it. Simple as that!

I seem to recall Ubisoft claiming they made the world smaller after people complained about Odyssey, but I'm pretty sure that's a big fucking lie. Not only is the world massive, it's also filled with little shitty things to do that don't add anything, and you have to go out there and do them if you wanna level up and see more of that shitty story that you don't care about.

Unless you wanna ... buy a widdle micwotwansaction? :3c Pwease buy one. Ouw lady-animatows awe stawving! Buy some and see the shitty stowy fastew!

They also somehow made the leveling and RPG elements worse, and I'm someone who rarely cares/notices gameplay or combat design. It's so bad that even I, a filthy casual, went "oh ew what the fuck." Sure, there's slightly less redundant loot than in Odyssey, but now you have to go out into the massive, empty world to find your actual abilities? That you use to play the actual game? "It was unrealistic that Kassandra had superpowers!" Oh but it makes more sense that Eivor read a book and can now leap 8 feet into the air? Or manipulate arrows after shooting them? Huh? Do not get me started on how you level up. There's so much and it's so overwhelming but the vast majority of the points you collect have no tangible effect on your actual gameplay.

It's like everything went wrong here! All of it is wrong!

The music is good as always, fortunately, but then they even wanged the historical authenticity this time around. It really feels just more like a neo-nzi's power fantasy than actual Vikings. I'm no historian and even I was baffled at how the game tried to tell me a handful of longships would somehow attack a fortified military stronghold? The vikings weren't cool epic strongman warriors, guys, they were basically pirates: ice edition.

Also minor note: m!Eivor sounds like a hoarse old man, while f!Eivor flip-flops between normal pleasant contralto to very-forced-badass-viking-someone-please-get-her-a-cough-drop. What happened* here?

Ugh. I'm glad I got this for 15 bucks at a Black Friday sale, ages after it came out. I still somehow feel ripped off. Probably because I poured hours into this game and it wasn't worth it.

One star for the music, the other for the fact that female/canon Eivor is hot and I wanna be her.

This game has convinced me that I shall never buy another Ubisoft game. Well, that and the ... ya know. Crimes.

(Ok another sidenote: I liked the little glimpses of Norse mythology. I actually quite enjoyed the magic mushroom nonsense. I feel like the rest of the game and setting is already unrealistic enough that the magic mushroom nonsense actually feels more fun and engaging than the "real world" shit.)

Probably the best AssCreed game I've played so far (and I haven't played all of them, only the first two and the newest ones that all the AssCreed purists hate). I bought this after enjoying Odyssey and hearing everyone compare it to Origins. I love mythology and figured that if there was more semi-fantasy nonsense set in a beautiful and historically authentic world, then this would be right up my alley!

And it was, mostly. But honestly, my main reason for enjoying this game as much as I did is Bayek. He's probably the best AssCreed protag Ubisoft will ever write (I haven't played the Ezio trilogy, Ezio bros do not interact), and if written by more skilled writers, he would've become as iconic as Ezio as the sort-of founder of the Assassins. And he's also hot. So there's that. His quest and story are actually compelling for most of the game's runtime. Everything sort of falls apart at the end, though. And it also stumbles whenever Aya is around.

Here's the thing: I think Aya should've been the main character, logically, but I'm glad they went for Bayek. It's a weird position to be in because it's obvious the devs would've preferred Aya to be the main chararacter, she's arguably the more important one in the grand scheme of things, but they were forced to sideline her lest the gamer bros shit their diapers for having to play as a woman. We saw the same shit happening with Odyssey and Valhalla, where apparently Kassandra and f!Eivor are "canon", yet all the marketing is about Alexios and m!Eivor. Ubisoft trying to have their gamer bro cake and eat the twitter woke money too. (And it worked, evidently. Ugh.) But I can't for the life of me actually ... like Aya? She's deeply bland as a generic "strong female character" archetype whose characterization doesn't seem to evolve or move anywhere. Bayek has layers, he has internal conflicts and traumas to figure out and explore as the game moves on. Aya is just ... there. I think they were trying to go for a story where the two of them had conflicting approaches to their common goal, where Aya is the more methodical one who wants to get to the bottom of things and Bayek is the one driven by grief and emotion. The writers could've delved deeper into that, made the contrast more intense; maybe Aya seems to be more methodical and restrained, but she's actually the more ruthless and bloodthirsty of the two, planning out intricate revenge plots that strike deeper at the heart of the Order and has more collateral damage, while Bayek seems like the more emotional and angry one but actually shows sympathy and mercy for his enemies? That way, we'd see that Aya is still deeply affected by and grieving her only son's death, and that inflicting pain upon the world is the only way she can express that.

Instead, Aya comes off as not really giving a fuck that her son got got, and this is more like ... a job to her? Or a hobby? While Bayek seems more focused on the mission and has a personal connection to it despite being framed as the more reckless one. Instead of us seeing how Aya is playing 5D chess and Bayek is barely keeping up, her cavorting with Cleopatra and other bigwigs just mostly comes off as her doing fuck-all while Bayek has to do everything himself. (Again, probably sidelining at work. Proof that sensitive gamer bros are a detriment to the storytelling potential of video games. Games are only art if you let them be, fellas.)

Idk man. It doesn't help that Aya is voiced by a British woman doing an absolutely inscrutable accent. I love you Alix but what the fuck was that. Not even sure I should blame you or the people who cast and directed you.

Soo yeah. This game's kind of a mess, but I wrote this big rant about it which means there was enough potential there for me to become invested. Which should say something.

Oh and the gameplay is fine I guess. Love me some Ancient Egypt. Good tunes also. Basically if you've played any other Ubisoft game and at least one RPG then you know what's in this here sausage. Bland but filling. Not quite as bloated as Odyssey or Valhalla, but still a somewhat grindy time investment. Worth it for my malewife Bayek though <3

As I mentioned in my Syndicate review, I'm not an AssCreed purist and don't care about whether or not something is a "true" AssCreed game.

I got Odyssey because it promised to let me play as a muscular Greek woman. And it did do that. It's very pretty, the combat is alright, the music fucking SLAPS, and Kassandra is my girlfriend.

My biggest gripe with this game is that it's just ... to fucking long lol. It's too long. It doesn't have to be as long as it is, especially considering how little story there is in comparison? You slog through hours of quests for like a minute of a cutscene, and then it's off to the next slog.

The game itself is fun, mind. As a stealth enjoyer, I found clearing out forts to be very satisfying. But when you're on your 30th fort and you just want to get to the next tiny slice of story content? Then even the fun stuff becomes a chore.

Not to mention how they artificially slowed down your leveling to make it even fucking slower, just to make you buy microtransactions.

So Odyssey is this endurance test, where you wonder if the story and characters are interesting enough to keep you hooked while the gameplay does its best to slow you the fuck down. And as far as writing goes, I think it's one of the better Ubisoft games, though it has a similar irreverent and comedic tone as Syndicate had, which a lot of serious gamer bros find annoying. Personally, I always thought the AssCreed story and premise were too stupid to take seriously anyway, so I quite enjoyed the characters and the jokey writing -- it fit the sunny and fantastical Ancient Greek setting, but it might not be for you.

Basically, Odyssey is truly an Odyssey. You really gotta enjoy either the story or the gameplay to slog through it, because both will make you wonder why you're playing it in the first place, and one of them will have to keep you there for the duration of the thing. If both fail, just dip, man. The only thing you'll be missing out on is Kassandra.

Here's the thing: I have no love or nostalgia for the AssCreed franchise. Mainly because a friend of mine does and she convinced me to buy the first two games on PC, many years after their initial releases, and they were so janky to the point of being unplayable that I ragequit both of them at the beginning levels.

But then I got a PS4 and I figured maybe these games are better with a controller? Or maybe the newer games are more playable since they're probably more streamlined? And I was correct! I picked Syndicate as my next attempt at getting into AssCreed because I love Victorian England/steampunk type bullshit and I thought playing as a girl would be fun, even if poor Evie gets fully shafted at the end.

Basically, I don't care about AssCreed as a franchise or the overarching story that's, let's be frank here, is dumb as rocks anyway. AssCreed to me is about dicking around in a historical setting. That's all it needs to be.

Syndicate is a fun little romp in the style of those Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes movies. Is it well-written? No. Is it a Proper AssCreed Game? Hell if I know, and I don't care if it isn't. But is it fun to run around a lovingly recreated Victorian London as a cool assassin in a cool assassin outfit, zipping and zapping across rooftops and dropping onto Templar necks like a particularly fat bird poop? Yes.

Syndicate is for that part of your brain that thought steampunk was cool but you couldn't afford to embrace the style because you were 14 years old and didn't have a personal income. It's for the kid in you that wants a sword cane because they're deadly yet sophisticated, and the kid in you that thinks you could take a guy twice your size if you mind-magic predict all his moves beforehand.

That's all it really needs to be. And you get to stab like a whole bunch of old British dudes with huge mustaches! What else do you need in a videoed game?

I don't think I've encountered a western RPG that's quite as ... whimsical as this one? The art direction and atmosphere feel like something out of a storybook, it's just so fun and colorful and gives me the same feelings I got when I was a kid reading fantasy novels. Sort of Spiderwick wibes, almost? With the fae and the little critters that bite your ankles.

But the game's not wholesome, it's weirdly horny in spots, clearly written by male fantasy authors, so of course it needs to be horny and edgy and violent. And tbh you can tell that it was heavily inspired by thicc fantasy novels because the game is heavy on lore and worldbuilding but the actual plot is fuck-all and the characters are cardboard cutouts. It's the type of fantasy where the writers flex their imagination in terms of creature design but then turn around and put their female characters in leather belts instead of clothes, ya know? It feels very immature in spots, which adds to the sort of childlike feeling of it all. You're just a Cool Guy/Gal running around punching out bad guys and isn't that what you want? Look at this hot elf lady! Isn't she a hot elf?

Really fun combat, though! It feels and looks super fun and snappy, and it's unique in that it lets you have cool powers from the start, so you don't get that usual slog of having shitty and boring powers in the early game. It fully embraces the power fantasy of being the Chosen One. You get to upgrade those cool powers as you go (which makes them scalable and worth having even in the late game) and get even cooler ones (ye olde meteor summon), and take your character in whichever way you want across three different combat styles. Also, this game is the only one where you can effectively play as a battlemage, at least in my opinion.

Overall, I think this game is heavily underrated, has a really fun aesthetic style and fun gameplay, but the story is really boring and lacks any interesting characters to root for and the RP potential is weak to non-existent. It makes up for in style and fun-factor for what it lacks in storytelling. Defo give it a go if you haven't yet, but don't expect vintage BioWare levels of writing. It holds a special place in my heart despite its flaws simply because of how fun and whimsical and adorable it is.