Recent reviews by Focket

"If we kill them all..does that mean...we'll be free?"

Right off the bat, I'll say you should probably only get this game if you're a fan of the series, don't mind it being very repetitive, and if it's on sale. Titan killing feels very unique and cool at first until you realize... that's all you do (unsurprisingly).

Luckily I'm a HUGE fan of the series so I don't mind it. However, if someone wasn't a fan I wouldn't be so sure if they'd like it. You get to fight alongside all of your favorite characters from seasons 1-3 of the anime, though you only get to play as your own original character in a condensed version of seasons 1-2. For the season 3 portion, you can ONLY play as characters from the main cast. This caveat is highly disappointing to many and I agree, since season 3 is just so important and it feels like they just didn't want to put any effort into making your original character fit in, something that the "story mode" also doesn't do well. Your own character, for the most part, is just a glorified stand-in. At least you get to interact with a lot of characters and get some amusing dialog from them. This aspect at least lets you know some characters better, since they have tried incorporating some of the OVAs into their character.

Another thing you might find disappointing is that the anime OST is not in this game. The game OST was created for the game, so you will not find any tracks from the anime here. Makes sense for legal reasons and copyright, but it would've been so damn cool to hear iconic tracks in the game.

As of writing I've completed the Story Mode portion and I'm almost done with the Character Episode mode (playing season 3 as a character from the main cast). I haven't even fully completed those modes for 100% completion and have yet to touch the Territory Recovery mode either, so there is a ton of content here if you don't mind the repetition. It's for these reasons that I would really only recommend the game to big fans of the series. If you are not into AoT at all, you most likely won't like the game. The modes in this game would give you a pretty good idea of the story at least, but a lot is skipped over for the sake of getting you into the action.

I could go on and on for this review, but I'll cut it here and say: If you like AoT and don't mind repetition, you'll probably like the game at the very least. Just get it on a sale. If you don't already like AoT, watch it! Or read it, and then come to check this game out.

After such a disastrous release, I decided to completely scrap my old review as many of my previous gripes have pretty much all gotten solved. With the 2.0 update, I can safely say Cyberpunk 2077 is an amazing, thought provoking experience. There's loads of fun to be had no matter what build you choose, and progression has been completely overhauled and feels so much nicer. There are still some bugs here and there, but it is almost entirely fixed. It is 100% worth your time now, and we can only hope the sequel can feel just as polished as what we have now.

I grew up as a very anxious boy alongside the the explosion of Rock Band and Guitar Hero here in the U.S. I was hardly social and had such a difficult time making friends (not much has changed but still...). However, one of the things I always looked forward to after school was coming home to play either Rock Band or Guitar Hero. They were a very nice coping mechanism for me. I was able to just relax by myself, playing good songs, getting into the beat and just trying to play as best as possible. Getting better was something I aimed for so I could play my favorite songs on higher difficulties, eventually playing on Expert and feeling extremely cool. No worries, only rocking out and good music. A great rhythmic escape from all the things I went through. I got tons of dlcs over the years, eventually shaping my music choice today and adding tons and tons of more replayability. In more recent times, thanks to things like Phase Shift and Clone Hero, (also Rock Band 4 but I don't have a console) I can still keep this love for the games alive.

While those aforementioned games can keep the spirit of Rock Band and Guitar Hero alive, Beat Saber has managed to recreate that same magic I felt when first getting into Guitar Hero/Rock band. Slashing blocks to great music, with many difficulty levels to ease your way into how the game works. Not to mention the tons of modifiers you can use to make an experience you want, such as No Fail mode which I personally turn on in any game that supports it. This is obviously a unique experience that VR has made possible, and I often find myself instinctively just dancing to the music while playing, thanks to the great base soundtrack and talent of the game's modding community adding in many good songs. It's almost therapeutic in a way, letting all your worries go as you just immerse yourself in slashy block land, getting ready to destroy blocks while flailing your arms. When done well, dodging obstacles like spikes and walls really adds in to the immersion and can enhance some songs really well. It can feel overwhelming at first, but if you stick with it you will definitely get better. You really feel yourself get lost in it, and it's such a great time that'll have you smiling once you realize just how genius of an idea this game was. I don't know if I'll ever be good enough to play some of those crazy Expert+ charts I see videos of, but I'm fine playing a difficulty that works for me and just having a great time on it. This game is seriously amazing, and it's gonna be one of the games I always come back to, just like I did when I was younger with Guitar Hero and Rock Band.

Just keep in mind two things: the campaign is kinda dumb, with some questionable choices like having modifiers EVERYWHERE. You should probably stick with it for an hour or two, then just play on your own. Second: you're gonna sweat for sure. Keep that in mind!

After finishing this game, there's really nothing I can say that hasn't been said already by countless other reviews. This was one of my first real VR experiences, so of course I had to check it out after having played the other Half-Life games as well.

The combat is great, the characters are amazing, the environment is very well done, etc. I was honestly quite upset back when the game was announced because it was a VR only title, and VR makes me quite sick. After getting a headset and playing through the game though, it is clear that being VR only was the best thing Valve could've done. It makes for a Half-Life experience that is entirely unique (obviously), and it does it so well.

However, as I mentioned before, VR makes me quite sick after being in it for a little after an hour and will usually give me a migraine. Though this is entirely a "me" problem and may be alleviated with enough experience in VR, it can make some parts of the game a bit tilting. Some puzzles left me annoyed and frustrated solely because I felt awful when trying to figure them out, even if the solution was simple. (The part of the game with "Jeff" was absolutely fantastic, for example, but I was trying not to die irl when playing it) It made me appreciate things the game did only after the fact. So maybe play this game with that in mind, that maybe you should have a tolerance built for VR first. Otherwise, the game is absolutely incredible and worth it.

Fantastic.

Mortal Shell kind of caught me by surprise. I heard about the game about a year ago before it launched on EGS, but I wasn't really in a souls-like kind of mood, the EGS exclusivity didn't help. I passed it up after watching some gameplay because it looked cool, but for the aforementioned reasons I didn't really jump on it.

Fast forward to about a week ago browsing Steam, I saw the game was finally coming to the platform and was feeling a souls-like itch again. I decided to grab it on launch and got the free DLC with it (which if you're reading this at the time of writing or about a day after, is still ongoing as an offer). I'm not the biggest Dark Souls fan, I played the main game of 1-3 and some NG+ but that was about it. Bloodborne on the other hand, I played a ton of and achieved Platinum on it with its DLC on PS4. This was the experience I went in with, and here are my thoughts.

I felt right at home with the movement and combat having played the Soulsborne games. I'm not a veteran by any means but feeling right at home made me excited to play. The initial learning curve of learning parry timings, getting used to the resolve mechanic and just the combat in general was tough though. I died a ton in the first few hours, but I wanted to get better and better because the game seemed promising. And I'm glad, because in my opinion the game feels like an odd hybrid baby of Dark Souls and Bloodborne. My favorite mechanic in the game by far is the healing riposte that the game has. As you progress you can unlock new riposte effects on parry (assuming you have enough resolve, which you get for parrying and playing aggressively). I tried the others but none were quite the same as just healing from a riposte, which helped keep my aggression up and made the combat really fun. This made the game feel like a real mix of Dark Souls combat with the aggressive playstyle of Bloodborne, making the game a mix of two already great games.

However, that's not to say the game doesn't have issues. There aren't many bugs that I experienced, but the ones I did were quite big. Some included getting stuck in animations causing me to die, getting stuck between objects and being forced to die, or even OP bugs such as the Axatana's Axe form special attack one-shotting a boss. In general, combat also didn't feel fully fluid. For the most part it was fine, but there were definitely some fights and encounters that just didn't feel right, like combat just didn't flow smoothly. It's hard to describe, but while the combat is fine it does not fully match the Soulsborne combat.

Another big problem is one I experienced from the Hadern shell, part of the DLC. Ability descriptions feel iffy and unclear, with Hadern being the biggest example. One of his abilities, for instance, allows for a different kind of parry, or so the game says, with your options being "improved" and "empowered." This is great, but I couldn't find what they do! Even looking online didn't give a clear answer. This happened with some of his other skills too, but at least it was easier to figure out what an improved Harden did.

A lack of information seeps into the main game too. You can unlock special weapon attacks, a kick (or throwing knives for Hadern), and as mentioned before a different riposte aside from healing. I had to look up all of this to see how it worked, because the game does not tell you how to activate your special attack, how to kick, or how to change your riposte (imagine my shock when I riposted and a dude exploded!). This is all quite minor when you know how things work, but it was annoying having to look all this up when a simple tutorial could suffice.

While the game is quite short (3 main dungeons + 1 main area, Fallgrim), my first playthrough was ~11 hours, taking my time and not rushing. The length adds to the replayability in my opinion, since there is a NG+ mode, a great way to experiment with other weapons, shells, and playstyles. I have hardly touched the meat of the Virtuous Cycle DLC, the roguelike mode, but I know I definitely will, and I will play several NG+s.

With this all being said, I would definitely recommend the game IF you have Soulsborne experience. And maybe at a discount if you are unsure. If you are on the fence, at the time of writing the game comes with the DLC for free for a few more days, so I would definitely try to jump on that. If not, wait for a sale, or bite the 30$ bullet and see for yourself if you like the game, just don't be intimidated by the learning curve. I really like Mortal Shell because this game feels like it has so much potential for a sequel that fixes all of this game's flaws. By making combat flow better, fixing up some mechanics and adding more areas, a sequel to this game could be perfect.

I've never played the original Resident Evil 3, so I can't comment on the criticisms about cut content in the remake. That being said, it is a bit disheartening to hear that a lot was cut out and I can definitely see why that would be an issue for so many people.

With that aside, this is basically the gameplay of RE2 remake but faster paced and less puzzle heavy. The game is quite short (~5-6 hours on a first playthrough on Standard difficulty), and Nemesis himself just feels like a chore to deal with in non boss fight scenarios (However, the boss fights with him are really well done). Where the game really shines for me is its replayability. I don't know why, but the NG+ style store after completing a first playthrough is insanely addictive. You're given incentive to go back through the game completing various challenges in order to get cool unlocks to use in other playthroughs. The fast paced nature of the game makes these unlocks tempting, like getting the powerful Samurai Edge or ammo crafting companion in order to make more ammo. Not only that, but beating the game on its base hardest difficulty unlocks another, harder difficulty, then another. Because of this, I've been playing through the game multiple times trying to get achievements and Records (the little challenges to unlock points for the item shop). I've been having a blast doing this, and at the time of writing I'm going through Nightmare difficulty, the second hardest difficulty, with an infinite ammo assault rifle, HP regen coins, and attack boosting coins. Key items, consumables, and small paths shift a bit on these harder difficulties too so you can't fully know what to expect with all of this either. I went in to this remake with low expectations after reading all the reviews and controversy around it, but I've been having tons and tons of fun.

Admittedly, I'm not necessarily the biggest Resident Evil fan out there. I've only played all the main entries (1-8), with my playthroughs of 2 and 3 being those of the recent remakes and that's about it. If you can accept that this game is faster paced and not fully authentic to the original, then you should have at least an enjoyable time with this remake, especially if you like replayability. I would definitely only recommend it on a sale though (~20$ USD), because it would not be worth a full 60$ if you don't end up liking the game enough to keep playing it over multiple times.

Super late edit: I have since played RE3 Nemesis and ouch. Lots left out of this remake, making it feel incomplete. While the remake leaves so much out, I still recommend it on a sale since what's there is fun. However, I really wish this remake had done more. It had a lot of potential that ended up going wasted.

Regardless of how you feel about Repentance or Isaac as a whole, there's one thing I think everyone can agree on: the soundtrack is easily one of the best in any game, ever. Repentance adds even more tracks, and every single one of them are amazing, and those were added for free! Even if you don't use the Steam music player (I don't), it's a nice gesture to buy the soundtrack anyways.

Great game, but you'll probably want to use RuneLite if you plan to play for long.

RIP