Recent reviews by UltimateUniverse

Having played 223 hours at time of this review. I personally cannot recommend people invest their time into this game until it undergoes further development.

Below is how I came to this position.

Combat: Combat feels tight and responsive with a gratifying and visceral combat system. Expect to see hordes being cleaved in halve or limbs being blown off. Its gruesome, its gory and its very satisfying. There are a variety of enemies from low tier hordes to elite armoured units which challenge the player to continuously adapt their play style. This keeps combat feeling fresh and engaging.

There is a decent variety of weapons to chose from between the different classes however the game was supposed to launch with 70+ different weapons and it has not, which has rightfully upset some players who were hoping to mow down heretics with the weapon they have always fantasied to use which were shown in previous artwork and trailers.

Classes: Closely tied to combat is the different classes which currently there are four. Each class as you level them really develop into their own unique experience and do not feel like a generic guardsman with a slight quirk. There are also weapons that are locked to certain classes such as the flamer for zealot, force swords for psyker and a grenade launcher for the ogryn (not an exhaustive list by any means). This does encourage the player to try different classes and keeps the combat fresh by trying the different weapons behind each class. Each class has unique feats/perks which unlock every 5 levels and by level 30 you will be mixing and matching these feats on your characters to tailor the experience to your preferred playstyle.

However anyone coming from Vermintide 2 will be disappointed by the class system. Whereas in in VT2, each character had multiple careers which could be unlocked by leveling and each had unique features setting them apart from one another. This made for a total of 11 different characters with different combination of feats: Darktide has the one career for each class greatly restricting the types of playstyle currently available. leveling of these characters takes time, which means for the first levels (and hours of playtime) the player will not feel a notable difference between the classes (except ogryn) which is further impacted by weapons being locked behind level thresholds. This results in the player using the same/similar weapon loadouts for the first portion of the game which can undermine the combat experience.

Progression: This is by far Darktide’s weakest aspect. No shared resources (crafting, money, weekly currency) between characters. No shared leveling which means each character needs to be individually grinded which can take between 20-30 hours to max a character. This is poor design as the game only opens at higher levels and the most positive engagement factor of this game is its combat. A working adult cannot and will not invest their limited recreational time just for the privilege of having a fun casual experience and I appreciate that some may consider the needs of a casual gamer as less important however the causal market is what keeps online multiplayer games viable and delivering new content. This design will on a long-term push away players who will chose to play literally anything else. This is made worse by the mission rewards which are inferior to Vermintide 2' system. In VT2 no matter the mission difficulty, players were rewarded with a chest that would contain three random level-based loot items however in Darktide not only do you only get rewards by chance at mission completion but it is also only one item. This limits experimentation with weapons and classes and makes the grind feel more tedious.

Crafting: Vermintide 2 had a reasonable crafting system that encouraged players to recycle old gear and try new weapons and styles. I cannot comment if Darktide has made a fair transition of this system to Darktide because it is not implemented with the only system currently in place to be refining (upgrading the tier) of your weapon. Crafting was vital to Vermintide 2 as only by tweaking and customizing your weapons did players manage to tune their characters to be effective at high difficulty missions. The lack of such a system not only makes the grind painful, it also restricts players access to the challenging (high reward) missions. There is little incentive to accumulate crafting resources right now and limited information from the developers on when we can expect this system to be implemented.

Cosmetics: Even though the crafting system is not finished, the developer was able to launch the game with a functional cosmetic store which I can understand from a development position. The feature was finished hence there is no practical reason not to launch with it. However this optically look bad and leaves a sour taste as it suggests development resources were used to finalise the micro transaction systems rather than game completion. There are also timers on these cosmetics encouraging impulse buying which is a departure from the more player centric model of Vermintide 2 and is unnecessary for this style of game where the player has already paid to play the game.

The cosmetics themselves are good with some particularly authenticate designs that feel right in the 40k universe. There are also unlockable cosmetics which can be earned by completing penances however some of these are not designed in such away to encourage team centric gameplay and others can be downright infuriating. Again, coming from the perspective of a casual gamer, cosmetics should not be so tedious that after 200+ hours some are still out of reach. This can be due to some requiring specific mission difficulties (as mentioned prior, these missions are hard to do without completed crafting mechanics) and others just seemingly unlocking by luck. This does not feel fun or rewarding.

Aesthetic: Darktide has done an excellent job of capturing the feel of the grimdark future of 40k. The levels are dark and dingy yet also have a grand gothic design which makes the player feel like a tiny spec in the glorious imperium of man. The sound design is spot on with weapons particularly sounding great, each weapon feels distinct and just by sound you can tell what weapon type is being used. Darktide also continuous the use of audio queues to alert the players of special enemy types which enhance the tension of combat. The music is by far the best aspect, the music designer Jesper Kyd has gone above and beyond in delivering one of the best OSTs of 2022. The OST partly carries this game and without it I feel this game would be a soulless grinding mess.

Performance: The game has gotten more stable as patches are released however the game continues to experience periodic crashes despite that I am running a near modern system. I have found the only way to play this game is to ensure DLSS is on, anti aliasing is off & ray tracing is off with frames capped. Blessed be the Omnissiah if you can run this game above 1080p at 60 fps at full settings. I expect this to improve in time but the seeming lack of optimisation will prevent many mid-tier systems owners from even trying to play this game at any decent fidelity. It seems counter intuitive of the developers to design these grandiose levels with beautiful lighting if the general population of players will have to play on low performance settings which undermines the aesthetic.

TL:DR If it wasn’t for the music and combat, this game would be struggling greatly right now. I recommend to wait until the new year, see how the developers takes this game forward and what commitments are made to improve the game.

Having completed my first full run and most of the side quests, I can say with certainty that this is a great game. Without getting too much into details, if you like fallout 1/2 then you will like this game.

The combat can be challenging and rewarding (or optionally you can play just for the story), the voice acting segments is high quality and the OST captures that sci-fi feel.

One of the interesting things aspects of the game is how you choose your 'wing' which you choose at the beginning of the game and can greatly alter how you interact with other characters. This is broken up into 5 different wings (White/Scientists, Black/Security, Blue/Engineers, Silver/Managers, Orange/Labourers). Depending on your wing opens up different dialogue options and different ways to complete quests. This adds replayability.

For the price it is, its worth picking up and playing.

I enjoyed this game, short, simple although,

-spoiler warning-
I found the endings didn't make sense, if you unlock all endings there will be ones where 'you' the character are the evil fake mike but in others the purple jumpered mike is the evil one.

This problem is shown again when theres a option to shoot Sarah outside the bedroom door. I originally shot Sarah and it was apparently the innocent version but if i waited to ask a question, this 'innocent' Sarah suddenly becomes the evil one.

Point is, it feels like plot holes were created to artifically create more endings without anymore real story being added.
-end of spoilers-

Ultimately, the music added to the tension in the game and the plot was pretty niche and interesting. For a free game, no complaints. Was a fun way to spend 1-hour.

Decentu enough game although the plot kinda ruined it for me. Still some of the mechanics do make it feel fresh but at the same time to removal of free roam and mindless destruction hampers to the destruction physics which made Guerilla so much fun. To be honest I would recommend sticking with Guerilla but if you get a coupon or this game goes on sale then it doesnt hurt to play it.

Where do I start. This game is addictive as all hell. It is a pure character role play orientated game where you play generation from generation of your family throughout the dark ages with everything revolving around how YOU as the player mould your character and his/her successors. This does mean that a single playthrough from just 1066 to 1453 can take in the excess of sevral days.

Have you ever wanted to play as a Spaniard with Russian culture who is a staunch believer of the Zoroastrian faith and conquer Germany? In this game, you can! That is just the tip off the iceberg of insanity. I have had a succession war with my 1st born son who was also the SPAWN OF SATAN, literally a hell baby.

Now understand this game can be daunting to new players especially because there are no real good tutorials provided by the game. That is definitely a shortfall and has to be made up with Youtube tutorials or experienced friends who play the game. The other problem is how random some events can be which can royally screw over a fresh game. I wont go into details but I am sure many of my fellow players can recount situations the destroyed their games. Also It pretty much a requirement to get game mechanic DLC such as Old Gods and the Republic to get the most out of the game.

That is the only real problems I can think of with the game. Otherwise its an excellent game with challenges and character driven role play. Fantastic modding community always re-inventing the game and extending the hours of life this game has. I don’t think this game can be adequately compared to any other just because how unique it is.

I rate this game 11/10

A great rpg with a steady pace throughout the game. If you want a new generation fallout game that better represents the originals then this is the game, it follows a greater focus on character development and how you interact with the world; appreciating the fact that not everyone cares about pure run and gunning (you can still do that but there is a high chance of death involved). It may be a sudden change from the atmosphere of Fallout 3 now that they have somewhat of a more civilised stable society and its rather reminiscent of the wild west styled games but that only serves to continue the atmospheric development. If you can embrace actual adventure and actually role play then you are in for a treat of post apocalyptic wild west vibe. All I can say is give it a shot and don't try to compare it to Fallout 3.

Classic FPS from my childhood, graphics and gameplay have aged a little but the core enjoyment factor still remains intact. Fun multiplayer and a decent campaign make this classic still a worthy game to own.