Playtime: 24 Hours
Score: 7/10
Very solid RPG game! I have been a fan of Dontnod ever since I played the original Life is Strange, as that game meant a lot to me during my teenage years. So I was surprised to see that they made a vampire RPG of all things. This game has been sitting in my library for a while and I'm glad I finally sat down to play it.
This game in many ways feels like a spiritual sequel to Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines and since that games sequel isn't coming for another million years, this is the next best thing. To start with the good, I enjoyed the story a lot, as Dontnod have always been great storytellers to me. It had a lot of twists and turns, and the characters were all very well done. Its helped also by some very good voice acting that really helps sell the dialogue. I also love the amount of choice and consequence you get in this game, that a lot of RPGs nowadays tend to lack. They also do a lot of interesting things with the vampire lore and I found it all very interesting to read through and discover.
The upgrade system for the weapons is also pretty cool. I'm not super picky when it comes to presentation and overall I enjoyed it. The vampire powers you get also are very cool with some I used constantly. My favorite being the power where you can boil an enemies blood and make them explode which is ripped straight out of Bloodlines which I appreciated.
The combat is okay overall. It can feel very clunky in the beginning but does get better as you upgrade your weapons and level up. Only thing I didn't like was the lock on mechanic which can get really annoying to deal with as it will sometimes switch targets while your still fighting the enemy you originally locked onto which I hated.
Some of the things I didn't like was the lack of fast travel. The open world map isn't too big (which I liked), but it can get really frustrating when you have to back track to previous districts and have to fight the same annoying enemies over and over. I'm also not a fan of the autosave system, as everything you do is tied to one save slot. I get that the devs wanted you to have to live with your decisions throughout the story which makes sense for a narrative focused game like Life is Strange, but I would have preferred a manual save system as that's typically how I like my RPGs. I'm not as big of a fan of the hint system where you need to find out more about a character through either questioning them, finding out from other characters or finding notes around the world. Its fine with side characters, but it can be very frustrating with some of the major NPCs for each district where you need to make a crucial choice with them and the best option, is locked behind you having all the hints for them unlocked. I just didn't like this system at all, and it lead to me having to make crappy choices. And finally I just wished there was more to the games ending. I got what I believe is the good ending, and it was satisfying, but you don't get any ending slides for any of the main NPCs or districts which was disappointing. Especially since some characters fates were kind of left hanging in my playthrough.
Overall though this was a solid game and I can recommend it to anyone looking for a shorter RPG.
All Games I have Played and Reviewed Ranked - https://www.backloggd.com/u/JudgeDredd35/list/all-games-i-have-played-and-reviewed-ranked/
Score: 7/10
Very solid RPG game! I have been a fan of Dontnod ever since I played the original Life is Strange, as that game meant a lot to me during my teenage years. So I was surprised to see that they made a vampire RPG of all things. This game has been sitting in my library for a while and I'm glad I finally sat down to play it.
This game in many ways feels like a spiritual sequel to Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines and since that games sequel isn't coming for another million years, this is the next best thing. To start with the good, I enjoyed the story a lot, as Dontnod have always been great storytellers to me. It had a lot of twists and turns, and the characters were all very well done. Its helped also by some very good voice acting that really helps sell the dialogue. I also love the amount of choice and consequence you get in this game, that a lot of RPGs nowadays tend to lack. They also do a lot of interesting things with the vampire lore and I found it all very interesting to read through and discover.
The upgrade system for the weapons is also pretty cool. I'm not super picky when it comes to presentation and overall I enjoyed it. The vampire powers you get also are very cool with some I used constantly. My favorite being the power where you can boil an enemies blood and make them explode which is ripped straight out of Bloodlines which I appreciated.
The combat is okay overall. It can feel very clunky in the beginning but does get better as you upgrade your weapons and level up. Only thing I didn't like was the lock on mechanic which can get really annoying to deal with as it will sometimes switch targets while your still fighting the enemy you originally locked onto which I hated.
Some of the things I didn't like was the lack of fast travel. The open world map isn't too big (which I liked), but it can get really frustrating when you have to back track to previous districts and have to fight the same annoying enemies over and over. I'm also not a fan of the autosave system, as everything you do is tied to one save slot. I get that the devs wanted you to have to live with your decisions throughout the story which makes sense for a narrative focused game like Life is Strange, but I would have preferred a manual save system as that's typically how I like my RPGs. I'm not as big of a fan of the hint system where you need to find out more about a character through either questioning them, finding out from other characters or finding notes around the world. Its fine with side characters, but it can be very frustrating with some of the major NPCs for each district where you need to make a crucial choice with them and the best option, is locked behind you having all the hints for them unlocked. I just didn't like this system at all, and it lead to me having to make crappy choices. And finally I just wished there was more to the games ending. I got what I believe is the good ending, and it was satisfying, but you don't get any ending slides for any of the main NPCs or districts which was disappointing. Especially since some characters fates were kind of left hanging in my playthrough.
Overall though this was a solid game and I can recommend it to anyone looking for a shorter RPG.
All Games I have Played and Reviewed Ranked - https://www.backloggd.com/u/JudgeDredd35/list/all-games-i-have-played-and-reviewed-ranked/