world tour actually kinda rocks and it's mostly just held back by it feeling like there's supposed to be more to the story after it ends idk. it let me make a cute character and i appreciate any game that does that :3 also seeing them fight in cutscene is so cool, i wish other games with created characters did more of that (hi ff14)

i don't feel like i'll ever be "good" at this game, my brain just isn't wired for long combos and such to punish enemies with. it's okay though, i'm still having fun at my scrub level :) cammy my beloved

Skulking on rooftops, blinking to an upper balcony and then possessing a guard and standing within inches of a target, I love those moments.

Being given the choice to kill or get rid of someone through ingenious and sometimes sinister ways is a big highlight.

The world of Dunwall is a dark and somewhat beautiful place, both filled with despair and and a few individuals trying to bring light to a dark world is a sight to behold, a immersive game like no other!

iD Software should probably go down as one of the best set of devs in history, because they have made a work so excellently crafted in its design and innovative in use of arena fps mechanics that it's easily the best game that has come out of this year so far as well as one of the best of all time. It manages to take every single lesson that needed to be learned from Doom 2016's failings and applied a perfect fix from a top-down level.

I've never played a singular fps that kept my adrenaline pumping at full blast for most of the way through, with encounter design so phenomenally set teeming with particular enemies that make true on its core gameplay loops. Doom Eternal juggles loops of resource management, enemy prioritization, and utilization of movement all intertwined to each individual enemy. From the Arachnotron, probably the best enemy of the lot that forces you to utilize its weak points while it dodges your fire and pressures you down, to the Cyber Mancubi, each enemy makes use of your weapon variety and asks for the best play you can muster especially on Nightmare difficulty (which I played on the whole way through). The waves are also set perfectly to where as you take heavy enemies down there's new challenges to surprise you, with especially the slayer gates and later levels showing the best of this wave design.

The weapon balance and depth is also excellent, with two alt fire mods you can swap with that each bring their own costs and benefits, as well as the resource grind constantly asking you to use your entire loadout. Good play isn't just tuned to dodging enemy fire and spacing yourself correctly, but also utilizing every single weapon to their fullest extent while keeping track of loot pinatas to keep yourself in the midst of carnage. You'll know when you're in the zone when you're hook jumping into the air and constantly keeping yourself up above them dashing and jumping as you pelt rocket damage down upon your foes. If you have a single thing not on cooldown you're not using everything that you have.

That's probably the most ridiculous component that iD managed to do, the huge complexity that the game slowly eases you in before letting you become a walking one man army of rip and tear. The pacing of unlocks is fine tuned to where you're always getting something new from level to level to play around with, with excellent tutorializing that makes sure you have the knowledge you need to play efficiently and work on mastering your kit.

Music and aesthetics are also fantastic, with every single level looking amazing compared to Doom 2016's mostly same-y color palette. This is probably Mick Gordon's best work too banging in the background, especially with its remixes of 2016's great hits and the final level keeping that blood pumping. Probably going to be listening to it long after I'm done replaying the game.

There are of course, some miscellaneous and weak components for a game so ambitious in its design and extremely accessible. The platforming serves as nice downtime to let your blood cool down, although some of it especially the swimming portions being kind of boring if not impeding on the nonstop joyride. Ideally I'd probably layer the mostly-and-intentionally-nonsensical codex-loaded story to be cutscenes between combat to give you downtime if you need it and allow them to be completely skippable, with some walking if out of dev time. Not that I don't appreciate some of the environments and sense of scale that you walk through, but one specific level i.e. Sentinel Prime seems almost like a weird pacebreaker that could've used way more over time development.

There's also some overtuning and balance issues in some places. The Marauder, while I can find him somewhat inoffensive, makes you play a different game. When you've killed all the rest of the heavies and he's the last one left, you play Sekiro and just time your shit to kill him. He's not an interesting enemy and I'd prefer better use of Archviles to force you into a "deal with this enemy while you fight the others" instead. Also some of the weak point exploits are too powerful, with Cacodemons especially taking one sticky or rocket to make them nothing. The bosses also ALL SUCK, and either need complete reworks or wayyyy more dev time to make them interesting and fun to fight. I give a pass to the Icon of Sin for being an amazing spectacle but even his fight is twice as long as it needed to be, serving as a bfg dump that's one phase too long.

Other combat issues: The BFG, Unmakyr, and Crucible are underdeveloped, although at least they're easily ignored. I can kinda get it with the BFG and Unmakyr, one's pretty much a get out of jail free card that requires no skill to use other than uhh don't hit a wall loser, and the other is a close range meltbox. I just wish the ammo was either one per level at MOST or in a different mode entirely (like a survival mode! they'd work like shmup bombs), because while they don't exactly make encounters entire jokes they do undercut the design by a significant margin. The crucible especially is probably the biggest disappointment. You have a whole level building up this sword that you craft over time, and all it does is IK for 3 pips, a get-this-heavy-off-me weapon with only one move. It could've been a way more fleshed out weapon with more utility and less breaking the game.

At the end of the day though I can't deny that this is not only the best fps game I've played but maybe even my all time favorite action game. These issues are something I can tolerate on my own, and the game gives free reign to fine tune a lot of the elements yourself. It's ridiculously accessible. I look forward to the dlc, and I think the rest of this year nay the decade has a lot to live up to after this. (10/10)

Outer Wilds is the only game I can think of where within its first moments, I knew I was in for something very, very special without really understanding why. The title screen is already so inviting, with its gentle acoustic glow fading in over a collage of shimmering stars. The game opens, I wake up on my back, looking up into the sky to see something explode in the distant orbit of a giant, green planet deep in space, and my imagination is immediately captured. I feel an intangible warmth as I speak to my fellow Hearthians and wander our village, a sense of wonder and anticipation as I walk through our peoples' museum, learning about things that I realize I will inevitably have to face or utilize in the adventures ahead. All this before even seeing my ship, let alone blasting off with it into the far reaches of space.

The expectations and tone of Outer Wilds are set up pitch perfectly in this opening. On the whole, the game captures the innate desire we all have to learn more, to reach out for what's next, even if we have no idea what it is we are searching for or why we seek it. It's the only thing Outer Wilds relies on to lead players forward. There are no objectives or goals, no waypoints to show you where to go next; there only those which you create for yourself. What drives us forward is the need to understand the world(s) around us, or at least attempt to understand. Is there a more human desire than that?

Outer Wilds is a masterpiece for its many balances: of warmth and intimacy with the melancholic loneliness of space; a constant sense of wonder with an equally constant fear of the unknown; its charming, colorful art style with its hard, scientific approach; its reverence for the teachings of both classical and quantum physics; its personal, micro-level character stories set against the fate of the universe. The list goes on. And that's without even mentioning the game's emotional linchpin: Andrew Prahlow's incredible score, a healthy mix of folk, ambient and post-rock that is a delicate tight-wire act in and of itself, managing to capture both the vastness of space and the intimate glow of a campfire without compromise.

Whatever feelings Outer Wilds brought out of me in its opening moments were only further heightened and more deeply understood as I began unraveling the mysteries of its clockwork solar system, spiraling faster and faster towards an ending that left me in awe of everything that came before it and soon yearning for other experiences that could fill the black hole that the game's sudden absence left in place of my heart. Outer Wilds is not only a perfect game, but also one of the medium's purest expressions of its most inspiring possibilities. If only I could breathe out a sigh of relief and wake up on Timber Hearth for the first time again.

its a humbling feeling to find a game that feels bigger than you

i dont even know where to start describing it. at its core, its a game about not understanding. the gameplay revolves around trying in vain to learn about your surroundings - to piece it all together and find a solution to a problem - only to die not because of a lack of trying, but because we just dont have the time.

the beauty of Outer Wilds lies right there. its galaxy is small, yet feels huge and only gets bigger the more you dig. by all means it should feel like a hopeless venture to continue exploring, but its too engaging not to. there is no end goal, and it makes no promises other than the fact you will die.

and the magic is that we did anyway. even if i didnt know what for, i kept exploring its planets to find its secrets. i felt giddiness meeting every character and hearing their stories. i pat myself on the back after solving puzzles once i asked the guy at the starting campfire how to.

Outer Wilds - despite playing as an alien - is a deeply human game. a journey about facing adversity through sheer willpower despite not having all the answers, and knowing youre not alone in that.

i cant do this game a service with my $5 speak and someone else could do a much better job, and thats ok. because like i said, this game - like its setting - is big. theres so much to talk about, yet its message is so precise. its mysteries are so complex, yet so simple in retrospect. games like these remind me how special this industry is, and what kind of art it can produce. Outer Wilds is a profound experience i likely wont forget for a very long time.

In my opinion, there are two main types(ideal) of fantasy stories.
One is the type that doesn't show the seedy side of medieval times, which is the basis of fantasy.
The other is the type that pursues realism and shows the dark side thoroughly.
The Witcher series, of course, falls into the latter category.
The sadly unfinished Berserk also falls into the latter category. (Although its ancestors are completely different.)

My first impression was, "I'm beat!".
"Finally, Western games have come this far. At this rate, the dominance of Japanese game companies will be wiped out in a few years.”

Japanese culture has always had a weakness for realism (both cultural and political). With the exception of a few geniuses, such as Kentaro Miura of Berserk.
This is because the essence of Japanese culture is caricature, deformation.
There is very little cultural soil for realism and realism in expression. In this sense, Kentaro Miura and Hideo Kojima is a rare breed.

I'm hesitant to complain too much about the poor combat action.
Small drawback and Japan’s game culture aside, I think the main attraction of this game is its worldview.
The detail is extraordinary.
The reality of war in a medieval world reminiscent of the Thirty Years' War, the language of the people of a poor village turned into a war zone.
For example, just after the opening scene. When I saw the corpse hanging from the tree, I was reminded of Jacques Callot's painting.
At that moment, I thought: "I've bought a tremendous game!”.
The second thing that struck me was the word of the peasants. I'm not going to write about this because it would be a serious breach of political correctness(laughs).
The funniest line came from a beggar in the city. "Help me! I'm being killed!!!...... To poverty.” Do you ever find yourself laughing when you shouldn't? lol.
I don't know of any game that expresses the world in such detail. And from the point of view of the Poles who made it, it's a dark part of their own past.
By the way, my favorite characters are Lambert, the lovable son of a bitch. And the ruthless and ruthless patriot, Dijkstra.
There are fewer and fewer characters with such strong habits in Japanese manga and games. I miss.

Maybe the negativity towards this game is a repudiation of the reality/facts of their past and present through the game. (It's just a guess.)
However, I applaud the great courage of CDprojektRED in making this expression.

It's a shame that the next cyberpunk had to go down like that, but it doesn't take away from the brilliance of The Witcher 3.

When I read it again, I see that I wrote it as I thought of it, so the sentence development is very messy.
I would like to make an additional correction later.

“You don't need mutations to strip men of their humanity. I've seen plenty of examples.”

I’ve never played a Witcher game before, nor have I journeyed into the world of the novels. Knowing nothing about the world, I was expecting a high fantasy universe of thrilling swordplay, bombastic wizards, and heroes triumphing over evil. The Witcher 3 did indeed have all of those things, but honestly, those were the low-points in my journey as Geralt of Rivia. The meat of the game lies in the “ordinary” NPCs – relationships between peasants and lordship, husbands and wives, fear and shame, and the reconciliation between justice and prejudice. The game deftly weaves these stories in as side-quests that offer more moral conundrum that the standard RPG fetch-this-item and kill-this-monster quests. Which is a little ironic, since the point of being a Witcher is to kill monsters, however CDPR does a fantastic job of making each quest fairly unique – never missing an opportunity for world-building in the process.

I will admit that I was not hooked during the tutorial area of White Orchard, but once I got a greater peek at how the politics, both between nations and neighbors, worked, my interest was officially piqued. The first true area available in the game is Velen, the most beautiful swamp and bog-ridden video game land I have ever seen. The landscape perfectly represents its ruler(s) and people as well – brimming with dingy life, dirty and twisted. It sets up perfectly for the rest of the world. The vistas and areas do become more visually pleasing, but corruption still lurks under the surface. I honestly think Velen is where the game works best, as you’re still trying to figure everything out in the main quest, but you are forced to run Witcher Contracts as well. You are dead broke, trying to understand it all like everyone else. The only difference is that Geralt is a Witcher with his swords.

Novigrad is also a triumph as one of the best medieval cities I have ever seen in a game. The streets really felt alive, and the inclusion of so many different areas like Hierarch Square, the docks, and Far Corners really helps immerse you in this town. The map, twisting and turning on itself through the buildings, also brings Novigrad to life in a way that many RPGs fail to with their miniscule cities.

The main quest, unfortunately, does not live up to the rest of the game. I am sure that a good portion of my distaste is because Witcher 3 is a sequel of a sequel of the books, but everything became much more esoteric the further along I progressed. Not much is offered in way of explanation of the Wild Hunt, and everything becomes over-the-top magic oriented. There are also some pacing issues which arise from the game giving the player false-expectations. Suffice to say, I was a little burnt out after finally finishing the seemingly marathon sprint of the game’s last act.

Part of this burn-out was also a result of the combat and leveling systems. The strength of the Witcher 3 is its stories and characters, and the gameplay/combat is simply a means to experience these events. So when the stories suffer, the other flaws begin to show. Geralt’s leveling system could use a focus on gaining new abilities rather than the generic “gain X damage,” “make X ability more powerful,” and etc. Give me a different way to approach an enemy; maybe a leaping attack, or a disarm move, or even some combos to pull off between the heavy and light attacks. Help me chain the signs and attacks together in some meaningful way. There are different attacks to unlock in the combat tree, but they don’t come until very late.

In the same way, the enemies and world also become static after a while. Higher level enemies are the same as their ordinary counterparts, just with more health. They need different attacks or tactics that differ from dodge-attack. Some of the best enemies in the game are the Rotfiends that require you to back away when you see they are preparing to explode, or the wraiths that require you to use a sign to even deal decent damage to them. They represent a mix-up from the standard, vanilla combat that makes the encounters feel fresh and exciting. Even the world traversal needs more work – more ways to approach an objective other than following a road. Let me climb, let me jump onto more things; let me fall further than 3 feet without dying instantly. Why make a giant world and then not let me play with different ways of traversing it?

These things converge into the main flaw of the game’s design for me – it’s stuck between an RPG and an Action/Adventure game, indecisive as to which way to lean. The combat is a low-light in the experience, and the RPG elements aren’t vast enough to meaningfully change the way the world is experienced. The player is Geralt, and they will always be Geralt. There are different builds within the leveling system through prioritizing signs, combat, or potions, but at the end of the day, you’re still going to be fighting things with your two swords. The ability to unlock companions to travel with would be a wonderful way to deepen the interaction with the world and allow you to indirectly experience different types of combat while still staying true to Geralt.

Overall, the Witcher 3 is with a deep and intricately crafted world of interesting stories, characters, and politics. Sure, the gameplay itself certainly has flaws, but the journey and experience outweighs those issues. The folktale-esque lore of the Witcher universe stands on its own as some of the best in the fantasy RPG genre.

I have played this game more times than I can count! The story led me to reading all of the books and I will always be grateful for that. It still has the best DLC of any game I have ever played.

Edit:
After having played the PS5 remaster, this game has truly proven its classic status. Sure the gameplay isn’t perfect (I enjoyed it for the most part) where it shines is it’s beautiful story, it’s rich tapestry and deep fleshed out lore. The sheer attention to the most tiniest detail and the larger than life characters. It truly is one of gamings modern masterpieces!