ViewtifulGaz
2016
Yeah... It's fine!
Looks great, well written and acted, but it's so full of stuff that comes to nothing (I know it's intentional) that the whole thing was just a bit deflating at the end.
Had a fair few technical issues with it too, clearly skipping a few bits of plot/dialogue as a result, which did not help.
I've put it off and expected to really enjoy it, but yeah, pretty disappointed! Oh well!
Looks great, well written and acted, but it's so full of stuff that comes to nothing (I know it's intentional) that the whole thing was just a bit deflating at the end.
Had a fair few technical issues with it too, clearly skipping a few bits of plot/dialogue as a result, which did not help.
I've put it off and expected to really enjoy it, but yeah, pretty disappointed! Oh well!
2021
A totally fine Zelda x Dark Souls mash up that made me wish I was playing either of those.
A great game if you like 3 hit combos with pointless upgrades!
It looks nice, it's cool to play as a bird, but the music feels like stock "nice ambient piano" the whole way through.
Pretty well suited to killing a weekend.
A great game if you like 3 hit combos with pointless upgrades!
It looks nice, it's cool to play as a bird, but the music feels like stock "nice ambient piano" the whole way through.
Pretty well suited to killing a weekend.
2022
I stuck it out the whole way this time and wish I hadn't.
And incredibly interesting premise and lovely looking game that's so full of small baffling design decisions it just breaks the whole thing apart.
It's a Shmup Metroidvania Deckbuilder. Except it's a bad at all of those things.
As a Shmup, your character has a huge hitbox and there's often so many particles on screen there's no way you can dodge them, so you have to rely heavily on bullet clearing cards. Even when you see the bullets coming, you'll often clip one because of your massive hit box.
As a 'vania, it's mostly linear with some very tedious backtracking on account of your slow movement speed. Most of the exploration mechanics you get are used a handful of times and don't really round out your arsenal.
As a deckbuilder, it could have improved the shmup combat, but in practice you get SO many bad cards that there's not much point in exploring. The fact that the cards are randomly assigned to buttons means you're usually best to just spam them.
Enemies are bullet sponges with bullet patterns that often punish dodging (again, pushing you toward bullet clearing spells).
All armor is temporary, except one broke-as-hell late game card that lets you restore a heart.
The writing is groan inducing and reads like a dream conversation with all your pals (and you cannot skip it).
Checkpoints are often terrible.
Difficulty spikes are often.
There's a bad submarine section, which is not as bad as a lot of people seem to make out.
I was so up for this game, and I feel like it's not a million miles away from being good! Building a good deck (eventually) feels great!
But the execution is not there and I couldn't recommend it to anyone.
And incredibly interesting premise and lovely looking game that's so full of small baffling design decisions it just breaks the whole thing apart.
It's a Shmup Metroidvania Deckbuilder. Except it's a bad at all of those things.
As a Shmup, your character has a huge hitbox and there's often so many particles on screen there's no way you can dodge them, so you have to rely heavily on bullet clearing cards. Even when you see the bullets coming, you'll often clip one because of your massive hit box.
As a 'vania, it's mostly linear with some very tedious backtracking on account of your slow movement speed. Most of the exploration mechanics you get are used a handful of times and don't really round out your arsenal.
As a deckbuilder, it could have improved the shmup combat, but in practice you get SO many bad cards that there's not much point in exploring. The fact that the cards are randomly assigned to buttons means you're usually best to just spam them.
Enemies are bullet sponges with bullet patterns that often punish dodging (again, pushing you toward bullet clearing spells).
All armor is temporary, except one broke-as-hell late game card that lets you restore a heart.
The writing is groan inducing and reads like a dream conversation with all your pals (and you cannot skip it).
Checkpoints are often terrible.
Difficulty spikes are often.
There's a bad submarine section, which is not as bad as a lot of people seem to make out.
I was so up for this game, and I feel like it's not a million miles away from being good! Building a good deck (eventually) feels great!
But the execution is not there and I couldn't recommend it to anyone.
2019
Incredible and unique experience
2019
Feels like it's close to being great, but all the Dark Souls trappings make it a lesser thing. Incredibly obscure side quest requirements (and potential lockouts) don't really mesh with the Castlevania style exploration when there are very few warp points and no movement abilities. Plus the last couple of bosses are a huge difficulty spike and then drop off a cliff.
But it looks, sounds and feels great!
But it looks, sounds and feels great!
2020
An absolutely incredible combat system that is undercut by all the story stuff at every turn.
The tone wildly veers and the jokes are often the most embarrassing shit.
Just make him an angry man who must rip & tear.
Combat:
The ballet between flamethrower, grenade, shoot, glory kill, chainsaw is just incredible and anyone who complains about the low ammo count is bad at the game.
The last boss is dreadful.
The tone wildly veers and the jokes are often the most embarrassing shit.
Just make him an angry man who must rip & tear.
Combat:
The ballet between flamethrower, grenade, shoot, glory kill, chainsaw is just incredible and anyone who complains about the low ammo count is bad at the game.
The last boss is dreadful.
2019
I think I thought I'd played this, but I clearly never completed it.
I had a great time with it. Still totally exhilarating to play.
I had a great time with it. Still totally exhilarating to play.
A great final boss marred by a very bad everything else.
2004
I always remember hearing that Doom 3 was the black sheep of the family, and was more of a horror game than the rest. This really only holds true for the beginning portion of the game, and the rest of it was way more Doom like than I expected!
You just have to approach it with the mind of the Doomslayer.
My only real complaints are that the AI totally sucks, and will frequently spawn directly in your face to die immediately to a shotgun, and that all of the imp "Jump scares" are really annoying.
The weapons do feel lame at the start, but by the time you're in the midst of later combat, you totally forget about it.
The shotgun is also nowhere near as bad as everyone says, and it totally serves its purpose of making you run up to the enemies to kill them.
You just have to approach it with the mind of the Doomslayer.
My only real complaints are that the AI totally sucks, and will frequently spawn directly in your face to die immediately to a shotgun, and that all of the imp "Jump scares" are really annoying.
The weapons do feel lame at the start, but by the time you're in the midst of later combat, you totally forget about it.
The shotgun is also nowhere near as bad as everyone says, and it totally serves its purpose of making you run up to the enemies to kill them.
2018
An incredibly fun game with a story that more than outstays my investment.
A totally fine shooter that doesn't really do anything that made the first one good.
The level design very rarely creates exciting encounters, the enemies don't feel "smart" any more.
The melee moves very rarely have a chance to shine.
The story, and particularly the ending, are dreadful.
It's decidedly not scary at any point.
But, for the most part, shooting stuff is fun.
The level design very rarely creates exciting encounters, the enemies don't feel "smart" any more.
The melee moves very rarely have a chance to shine.
The story, and particularly the ending, are dreadful.
It's decidedly not scary at any point.
But, for the most part, shooting stuff is fun.
2018
Eh.
2019
Ach, man. What a disappointment in the end.
The combat is almost good, but every fight is the same loop and I'm either taking 0 damage or dying in one hit.
The world and all the wee side stories are so cool and the story is so interesting but just comes to a "this is it for now, buy the DLC" ending.
The game is really bloated by bad sidequests, which I recommend skipping, and a weird need to be a metroidvania... and that DREADFUL map.
I really wanted to love this.
The combat is almost good, but every fight is the same loop and I'm either taking 0 damage or dying in one hit.
The world and all the wee side stories are so cool and the story is so interesting but just comes to a "this is it for now, buy the DLC" ending.
The game is really bloated by bad sidequests, which I recommend skipping, and a weird need to be a metroidvania... and that DREADFUL map.
I really wanted to love this.
2007
Fucking hell, man.
Maybe this was good at the time, but going back to it now is hell.
The character moves like an old resi character, the platforming sucks and the combat is mostly just non-stop Izuna Drops (This is actually a good thing).
The Rachel bits were dreadful, and this was the point that made me quit for good.
https://twitter.com/ViewtifulGaz/status/1612124904106639361
Maybe this was good at the time, but going back to it now is hell.
The character moves like an old resi character, the platforming sucks and the combat is mostly just non-stop Izuna Drops (This is actually a good thing).
The Rachel bits were dreadful, and this was the point that made me quit for good.
https://twitter.com/ViewtifulGaz/status/1612124904106639361
2018
A fun, short, time