Recent reviews by AvG

━━Resonance Score━━
☑️ Left a lasting mark
⬜ Will definitely revisit
⬜ One and done
⬜ Didn't finish
⬜ Wouldn't purchase again

━━Breakdown━━
Initial Feel
⬜ Instantly hooked
☑️ Grew on me
⬜ Took time to appreciate
⬜ Never quite clicked

Mechanical Flow
⬜ Perfectly polished
⬜ Satisfyingly smooth
☑️ Takes getting used to
⬜ Never feels quite right
⬜ Actively frustrating

Schedule Flexibility
☑️ Perfect for micro-sessions
☑️ Easy to pause and resume
☑️ Needs dedicated time blocks
☑️ Requires long uninterrupted sessions

Hook Level
☑️ "Where did my evening go?"
☑️ Regularly loses track of time
⬜ Balanced engagement
⬜ Natural stopping points
⬜ Easy to walk away

Mental Engagement Required
⬜ Podcast Game
⬜ Split Focus Friendly
☑️ Active Focus
⬜ Full Concentration needed

Learning Curve
⬜ Intuitive flow
⬜ Rewarding challenge
☑️ Steep but fair
⬜ Frustratingly complex

Break-Friendly Design
⬜ Easy to remember mechanics
☑️ Needs refresher time
☑️ Steep re-learning curve
⬜ Like starting from scratch

Game Development
☑️ Extremely flexible for modding
☑️ Frequent developer updates
☑️ Long history with making fun games
☑️ easy for modders to adjust how you want it

If you are unsure then consider it a 1-2 year investment at the current price. You name what people can think of and it will likely be added to the game by either the developer or a modder later.

Did you like the first game? [yes]

Do you like beating up monsters? [yes]

Do you like trying different classes without much restrictions on gameplay? [yes]

Do you like exploring even if the rewards are mostly the roads traveled and personal experience? [yes]

Do you like pawns and seeing your friends share them together? [yes]

If [yes] to all of these I think you should consider this game. The only deciding factor I recommend checking is if you can meet the computer requirements comfortably. The developers have stated they are working on a performance patch.

Gud.

Yes.

Look up community patch and thank me later.

For my background I had a lot of fun with Xcom series, including the older games and also played a lot of Xcom: Enemy Unknown and Xcom: Enemy Within. While I purchased EU and EW immediatly on release I knew there was going to be more dlc in Xcom 2 so I held off until I knew the Xcom 2 (complete) edition was available on sale before purchasing. Because of the extreme time lapse between the two game releases I can give a different perspective than most, at least, with my interaction so far. All of this review will focus on the complete edition including the latest expansion War of the Chosen and will give thoughts and if this is the game for you to pick up.

The story: A definite upgrade over the EU, it will draws you in to the hopless situation and how your activities are attempting to reverse course the aliens Doomsday project and have to use everything you can pull together to win.

The gameplay: Fine tuned but still similar to EW, there is a great deal more options and abilties to work with. I like what they have done with the factions you can recruit. The pacing in missions are stressful bundles of fun that have resulted in me spending more calculation time trying to see future alien moves. The aliens seem a bit more resistant to baiting into traps and require more flanking manuvers that eat up precious time. I am glad they introduced cards that can manipulate the missions, like the card that allows the mission to pause countdowns while your entire team is cloaked. There seems to be a pretty nice mission pool with many different areas to keep you exploring carefully in new areas you are not familiar with. The Chosen are powerhouses but I was able to force several to retreat on their 1st and 2nd encounters without any pre-knowledge and adapting to the situation.

Music: pretty decent, but it may get old after a few dozen matches as the music tends to repeat a bit.
Computer settings: (default)
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 950 3.07GHZ, 8GB Ram (amd 460-2gb)
Loading times: Low, but some video was delayed slightly(finish mission or start mission) but without causing sound delay or game delay, animation was without fps drops except in the very beginning of mission or end load. Actual missions were without fps drops. This was without any computer fine tuning for Xcom 2.

Everything in the game feels like a hard earned reward, especially when you win, and every failure is a learning platform to make your next move a better one. There will be a lot of failed moves that may lead to a loss, but if you are playing an Xcom game, that should make your next game even better. If you waited this long to pick up Xcom2 for a better price you will most likely enjoy it like I am. I don't spend too much time on the photo-op for soldiers but I do enough to notice they get placed in mission zones, and I also love the customization for soldiers. I have yet to try mods but I look forward to it! It's a nice touch to see the ability to add full customized soldiers into the random pool so you can see your favorite soldiers return in later games.

You can own a bar.

Valkyria Chronicles is a strategy game with a gorgerously hand drawn artstyle similar to reading a classic book. The story unfolds between missions and you get attached the characters as you play. The story pulls you in while having light hearted and darker moments that tug on your heart strings. There are some hidden sidequests for replayability. This game is definitly worth a playthough and should be on every Steam users shopping list. Valkyria Chronicles should receive the test of time reward for it's unique art style that will endure just like classic storybooks do.

Start playing Tutorial
Lost connection / retry?
Music is pretty soothing
10/10 GOTY

If you enjoy RPG's with turn based combat this will be your game of the year. Comes with a very flexible creation tool kit after release for modding or creating your own beautiful campaigns, stories, and crazy stuff. Music is beautiful and the co-op works wonderful. This game is twice as good if you have a friend to play it with but you can set the AI to play the 2nd character if you wish. Take note there is not hand holding on quests you will need use smart thinking clear them.

Did I mention you can pick up a skill to talk to animals?