OK, I got to play the game, I played two cups and a half. Well, in reality it was the first cup and the 2nd cup up, up until the last track…

VERRRDICT!

Alright girls n' boys, I'm… not… gonna sugarcoat it. This game blows, like, not in a super good way or super bad way, it still has me stirred but, now having played it, I may be a bit less stirred. I like how the initial setup looks like, but the tutorial is STILL absurdly long, 45 minutes minimum, how? No idea, but it's there. It can be skipped with the "Let's see you do it, hotshot"-type race and I find that annoying, or thru an obscure code, like Online and Addons. And I still find the idea of locking Time Trials, a kart-racing essential, downright abysmal!

As for the REAL game? It's a mess. A sort of lovable mess, I can't really hate it, but it's maddening, to a degree. I think the problem is that there's too much going on in a race.

You've got the track and your opponents to take care of, you've got the roulettes to take care of, you've got THE ENVIRONMENTAL DANGERS to take care of… putting it midly?, It's sensory overload. And there's too many mechanics to boot, same for the controls; too many buttons… for a Kart racer. A type of game where you can just— get up and go race at a few clicks.

And then there's the race AI too, who is very much happy to rubberband at a moment's notice and get spiteful if you as much as win 2 races in first, which is CRAZY and almost feels like some of your wins are unwarranted and come down to pure luck. So at times, the game can feel downright punishing if you do the slight miscalculation of drifting at the wrong angle.

The unlock system is another whole can of beans; did you know the rewards in the challenge grid, while "set", are truly random? Your neighbour's build might have Metal Knuckles on the top row, but yours may have a Chaos Drive Follower on the top row, so there's no clear "unlock path" which can lead to some truly "Guide Dang It" moments. And the requirements get crazier as you go on, too! An unlock chain can go on for MILES across several Unlocks. It reminds me a bit of those convoluted urban legends of yore, and that's fine! I find that funny too, but it becomes unfunny at some point.

All in all, this gane is NOT for everyone, and it shows. It can feel beginner-unfriendly, it can be messy and some tracks can be overdecorated, racing is a test of your attention span at times and worst? It may feel like the game is conspiring against you. The tutorial could benefit from being divided into separate "beginner" and "advanced" tutorials, and a less aggresive way to skip it without the code could help too. The game could greatly benefit from Time Trials being unlocked from the start so people can ease in to the wild variety of tracks, and the AI could ESPECIALLY take a chill pill or two. I'm pretty sure there are more flaws with the tutorial asides "ough Tutorial long", but we'd be here forever.

Overall, this game definitively exists. And if you like it, that's fine, and totally awesome! But for me? Damn, it sure hits different. I'm just hoping it gets some QoL updates down the line..

I am so incredibly disappointed with Dragon Age: Origins. There is common discourse online that this is one of the greatest fantasy RPGs ever made. To address this, let's look at the two core pillars of the genre - gameplay and writing.

The writing for this game, the plot and setting, the dialogue and the characters, feels lacking in a way. The world is well crafted enough, but it lacks a distinct edge. It's fantasy, it's evil monsters, it's civil war - but it's never innovative. I found the characters to be underwhelming too. Alistair and Morrigan were my two favourite companions, while everyone else I found felt disconnected from me. They just join you basically out of some vague duty to save the world or just because they don't have much else going on. I can recall very few characters relating to quest lines that were interesting enough to make any lasting impression either.

But whatever lacks in the writing department, it's still a cut above most video game writing - I will give it that. My number one issue with this game is ironically how much the game gets in the way. Simply put, the gameplay is tedious. Bad, even, at times. And yet there are literal hours between story beats that oblige you to trudge through dungeons killing room after room of bland enemies. I know this is a 2009 release, and therefore isn't going to be technically fantastic, but the enemy variety is so poor. This is exacerbated further by every enemy being fought the same way anyway, meaning any visual variety (of which there is little) hardly matters.

On that note, the game is ugly. Again, expected, but that doesn't change the fact. Animation is stiff and the world is so utterly bland. This is worsened by the abysmal soundscape; the game's soundtrack is so poor it may as well not exist, while the sound design is distinctly lacking. From a bustling market in the capital city to the otherworldly planes of the Fade, there is basically just complete silence - maybe the bare minimum ambience just to keep you from thinking your sound system has entirely stopped working.

So in the end I find little to recommend about this title. I have seen online that this game is placed alongside other contemporaries in a certain "big three" of the fantasy gaming genre. This in 2009, Skyrim in 2011 and The Witcher 3 in 2015. These comparisons do the game no favours. The world is far too unimmersive to be mistaken for Skyrim, while its narrative lacks the charm, wit and creativity of The Witcher's setting and characters. There is a place in the gaming canon for Dragon Age, but I don't believe it is worth revisiting. Know it's place in history, but feel no obligation to ever visit it.

"999 roses surround me. No matter how many times I am reborn, I will always remember you"

A gold star for its story and characters, I really didn't expect some twists.
Gameplay is not that hard but for a casual gamer it might be, especially the final boss, the music is... strange but really enjoyable, I have to listen again some OSTs.
There is a annoying game loop untill the 4th ~ hour and it might results boring but after that part it starts to become really interesting.
Graphically's ups and down, with some really high peaks.

7/10