Recent reviews by RealCaustic

Even with the stuttering issues and some other nuisances, I have greatly enjoyed playing this game. The combat does not have as much depth as Dead Space, but the atmosphere and overall gameplay kept me entertained for the 13 or so hours I played. Looking forward to a new game + experience.

I have managed to have 2 marathon game sessions in this game that required both a reinstall of the game and several hours of troubleshooting to even get the game to launch.

I love the Nioh series but unfortunately until this game is patched, I cannot in good conscience recommend the game.

More to come once patching is out...

Completed main game on PS4 on Balanced difficulty

I am going to preface this review with me being a long time Darksiders fan. I have copies of both the originals and the remasters. I played Darksiders 1 and two on both Xbox 360, and PC along with the HD remasters on PC and PS4. To say that I have been looking forward to this game for a long time (6 years) is an understatement.

The Darksiders series for me has always been one of replayability. Not something you come back to after playing through the game, but rather something you come back to because you get nostalgic for its combat combo fun.

I was a bit remiss when first seeing and playing the Darksiders 3 demo at PAX West in September. Though it felt more fast-paced than DS1, it stripped out all the loot mechanics and customizability of DS2. It took on a more survival action style (a la Bloodborne) with some action flashes fresh from the playbook of Castlevania: Lords of Shadows. The game was difficult (the demo was on Apocalyptic) but not insurmountable, and I was able to smash through the first boss within my first couple of tries.

The comparisons to Dark Souls I believe are unfair. This game while sharing some of the mechanics from Demon's Souls (central hub, interconnected locales), it gets a lot of flak for game mechanics that From Software did not invent (the collection of souls, using materials to upgrade weapons and enhancements). These are simple game tropes that I believe Gunfire Games used to faciliate a return to the simpler leveling system from the first game while still changing up the gameplay mechanics with Fury to hightlight how the Horseman's fighting style differs from the protagonists of the first game.

So with that out of the way, let's look at pros and cons:

Pros
- fast paced combat (now with dodge cancel!)
- continuing the Darksiders story with a solid entry. Yes there are some plot holes, but overall I enjoyed Fury's storyline and (SPOILERS) growth.
- enemies are varied and have different attack moves
- locales are diverse (map design)
- NO MINI MAP (yes this is a plus)
- beautiful character designs for both Fury and the Lord of Hollows
- BGM is fantastic, I listen to it at work. Each level has a clear distinct theme which the music ties into wonderfully

Cons
- framerate in Bonelands and Scar gives me PTSD from my misadventures in Blighttown (#thisisafeature))
- combat is very restrictive and does not flow as organically as the previous games (this is changing in patch 2)
- Boss battles could be a bit more difficult. I found that the bigger the boss, the easier they were. Some arenas are too large for the boss you are against.
- too many narrow misses. Grappling wall fails, Whip swing detection misses, ledge edges being closer than they are drawn which leads to you falling instead of jumping.
- AI trained to hit you in mid landing animation from whip swings or not suffer stagger / animation cancels on Havoc Counters even though they can interrupt you
- audio cutting out or dropping to really low levels that can only be recovered by restarting the game and losing progress

Wow that is a significant number of CONS. But... BUT, I do recommend this game.

It is a throw back to a time with games were hard, did not hold your hand, but were still a blast to play and you felt some sense of accomplishment upon beating the last boss and the end credits rolled in.

The game may not be for everyone, but with the effort the Gunfire is putting into addressing issues, the frequency of the patching, and hopefully an NG+? (come on Gunfire, we needs the precious) This will be another entry into the Darksiders lore that I will be playing again and again when I want to hack and slash my way through angels and demons.