Recent reviews by Mallory Forever

I've never felt so lost in a video game.

8.5/10 It's really short, to be honest.

Volcano Princess is definitely an "experimental" type of game imo, as there are a lot of things I like and dislike, but one thing I had in mind after I finished my first run is: Why "rouge-lite"? I couldn't figure out the reason behind it as Visual Novels or Life Sims already have multiple endings to let you try different route each time you play, perhaps it's for the "random event"? But still doesn't make sense just brute-forcing a genre into another one. The only thing that I'm so puzzled after my first run is to see a screen where I can literally UPGRADE MY START STATS, which is... unusual in a Life Sim, and utterly strange since it straight up contradicts the story of a father toilfully raising his daughter up. (although most of the mid/late-game is just the daughter wandering almost everywhere) Don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed the game, but I just don't think our "life" works that way, and it might be the reason I felt strange playing my 2nd run that I never finished.

Well, what I've written down doesn't mean that the devs shouldn't do experiments on stuff like these, but only this one that I felt I should point out this problem; I can see there will be other players who liked the game debate with me, saying it's for the replayability, or it's for the much faster restart/early game. I always ended this thought with the conclusion of "why making it rouge-lite in the first place?" or "why don't you make it another type of game that fits the 'rouge-lite' genre?" Because just like what I've written above, I personally think the "visual novel" or "life sim" type of game simply doesn't need it, cause it has multiple endings and different route to let players go for, which is "replayable" enough if the content is engaging and fun. Also, we have saves in case if we want a faster restart.

Just in case if anyone's annoyed by this long essay, I'm happy if anyone gives me an opinion, whatever the detail will be. also the translation is kinda meh tbh, you should thank me that I also speak Chinese

Rate it a 7.5/10
If there is a choice between recommending and not recommending, I will choose that.

This is addicting...

9/10

Suck it, kotaku.

8/10

Honestly I wouldn’t say it is a masterpiece but most of the gameplay is pretty badass. Besides some performance issues the game is quite fun for me.
Is it souls-like? Not really, it is more like Monster Hunter or Sekiro, or all of the souls-like game combined and tuned down a level; in simple terms, it’s an RPG, a really hard RPG game.
I understand that some of you guys have some bias on Chinese studios, or you really believe those “diversity” propaganda bullcrap. I only want to try the game myself, it’s okay to have your thoughts, so I’ll also have my own.
Now let’s be a jerk. Since I’ve played a couple of souls-like games myself, I can clearly see what the devs were going. I have a strong vibe of early souls-like like Dark Souls 2, and some elements of Monster Hunter and Hollow Knight. The game has some unique combat implemented but it mainly feels like a lot of things were “sutured together” and I really don’t know how to transcribe it since it gave me a mixed experience while combatting. But if you’re a new player experiencing this type of games, then it is for you, cause it’s easy as hell compared to other souls-likes.
Now, performance issues. I’ve heard a lot of things about stuttering & black screens. I didn’t experience it myself, but most of the time my frame rate was around 60~90 so I wouldn’t say it is terrible. But sometimes when there’re a lot of particles, it will drop to around 20~30, which is really bad since half of the bosses have particles around them. You can tune the graphics down a little bit to “neutralize” the issue but I know you all want that big juicy scenery all the time without loosing your frame rate, right? So yeah, I hope they’ll fix it asap.
Generally I don’t want to write something so long I don’t even want to read, but I think it’s necessary to tell everyone my honest opinion of this game, and my stand that I don’t give a F about the ones who don’t play games, cause I play games. So take that, IGN.
One thing I forgot to mention is the utterly stupid ♥♥♥♥♥ translation, especially English (since I launched the game with that crap) and I just couldn’t continue playing until I swapped it back to Simplified Chinese. I kinda understand why the translation is so bad cause most of the content is just Chinese mythology and fictions, but I really do think they’re not even trying. Do better, okay? This is the only crap that pissed me off. Don’t ask, I’m Chinese. I do know the difference between the two.
下边这段话是给中国玩家说的，发自内心的一句劝。先把游戏玩了，别在这儿发什么没用的B玩应儿，有好的就夸，觉得不好的你就批评，好玩就好玩，不好玩就不好玩，别搁这里跟我讲情怀，咱花了钱是为了体验游戏的，不是来看别人脸色的。（除非是别人给我买的）

I queued a team finder match for the coop-focused campaign today. Both of my teammates were experiencing this for the first time; one of them didn't speak, and the other only typed Chinese. I was like typing stuff in the middle of fights to tell them which thing they had to do while translating the same sentence into Chinese. We somehow managed to finish the mission with only 2 restarts cause I was constantly running out of ammo. Now I have two new friends. I love this ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ community.

9/10

WORTH

this update somehow broke my steam and it couldn't even install the newest update. Had to uninstall and reinstall.

Whatever the hell this is, I'm buying it.

8/10 (good with friends)

I spent 50 hours to clear the first map :|

and I realized I didn't

10/10

This game has some serious balance issues.

6/10

just not good enough, but I did have fun playing coop tho :|