Recent reviews by Insatiable Wrath

Most superhero games have fluctuated in quality for the most part, from the horrible, to the somewhat enjoyable quality.

While Batman games have had a far more generous treatment than Superman's (Superman 64 anyone?) one can hardly say that these games have ever been as amazing as they should be.

Well, up until Batman: Arkham Asylum. Yes, finally. This game not only portrays the Batman universe accurately and with detail, it does the one most important thing. It makes us feel like the Batman.
Everything about this game screams high quality. From the detailed menus, to the flawless fun combat, it remains true to Batman and gives the genre the epicness it deserves.

Let's begin. Arkham Asylum basically starts with you, the Batman, apprehending the Joker and taking him into custody into this facility dedicated to rehabilitating psychos, which Gotham is home to many. However, the Joker had a plan up its sleeve, and you'll have to stop him before he, his henchmen, and many other villains from wreaking havoc upon Gotham. The plot may be pretty standard, but it's excellently done.

The voice acting is phenomenal, as is the immersive scenes you'll come across. The villains themselves are many, some with their own hidden agenda, some well known such as Harley Quinn, the Joker, or Poison Ivy, to some more obscure ones reserved for avid fans. It's great to see them all so accurately portrayed, given how diverse Batman's opponents are throughout his long history of crimefighting.

The Asylum itself is actually pretty big. Beyond the various facilities, the entire island is available for you to explore, albeit sections of it may be closed off either for plot purposes, or because you're missing a certain gadget or skill in order to be able to reach them. This, combined with the rather closed and linear feel of the game overall, gives it a pretty big Castlevania vibe. You'll notice areas wondering how to get to, until you get that one gadget and then it just clicks with your brain, allowing you to get there.

But is the exploration worth it? Yes, yes it is. The game rewards you lavishly for exploration, as all games should. The main part of the collectibles make sense in the Batman lore, as it turns out the Riddler himself has planted them all over the Asylum, and as his namesake demands, also placed riddles for you to solve. He will start out sarcastically complimenting you as you solve the first ones, gradually becoming nervous and afraid you'll solve them all as you progress further. It's great fun just hearing his reactions couples with juicy collectibles, like optional challenges, character biographies providing detailed insight into each character in the Batman mythos. Other collectibles include recording tapes from interviews made by the medical personnel to certain villains, letting you know just a bit more about them.

This is all fine and good, but I could not end this review without talking about the strongest point of this game, its phenomenal gameplay. It plays so well on the PC it's unreal. Kicking groups of thugs, dodging about, sneaking up on them and taking them out. The AI's great, they'll actually freak out if you're good and take them out one at a time.

It feels like you're the Batman, I can't stress this enough. And that's exactly what these games should be about. Can't wait to get my hands on Arkham City. Arkham Asylum is a must play, and even if you don't care about Batman, you'll end up loving it.

This game is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. It has some atrocious voice acting. This may be a plus for you, and if it is, you're in luck, as it's about the only redeemable part about it. Especially the random Italian dude who goes by the name of Paolo Bellini. He's a boss. And the two drunkards in the beginning of the game too.

Everything else though? Well, let's see here. The gameplay is asinine. You'll have enemies shooting you through walls, shouting the same 3 lines of dialogue over and over again just to occasionally peek out the corner to try and take a shot at you. They're damn accurate but fortunately you have shrooms (hubbardium) that gives you bullet time so I guess that's okay. :|

There's a plot but it's forgettable since it's been done so many times before. Yet the game thinks otherwise as it loves its cutscenes, sometimes being really long and drawn out. Also I guess there was a twist but you could see it a mile away anyway since there were only like 5 characters. And when the plot tells you one of them isn't what they appear to be, I'm just going to say that it's probably not that hard to find out.

The dialogue and the voice acting, as mentioned above, are so bad it's good sometimes, especially the main character's attempts at humor. And you get calls, a lot of calls. One of these even got me killed once, as my character sat there listening as the dialogue kept going on while this one soldier kept shooting him until he was dead. And no, I couldn't skip the damn call. Autosaves? What are those? This game doesn't do autosaves until you beat the level you're in, so get used to quicksaving a lot.

All in all this game is worth it only for the ridiculous dialogue but you can probably find that in YouTube clips. Play it only if you're high, otherwise, avoid.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is the new blockbuster RPG from Bethesda. Is it the "ultimate RPG" all the hype surrounded it portrayed it as? No, it is not. But that's because no single RPG is for everyone. If you're looking for Dragon Age or The Witcher in Skyrim, you won't find it, as they're different kinds of RPG.

If you're a fan though, and you're mainly looking for more Elder Scrolls, you can't go wrong with this. Much like the previous game in the series, Oblivion, it offers a mindbogglingly huge amount of content from the get go. Content that will take hundreds of hours to completely go through. And by then, you will have forgotten such a big part of it that a second playthrough doesn't seem like such a bad idea.

Unfortunately, just like Oblivion, at the end of the day there isn't a huge variety of dungeons and once you've seen one of a said type, you've pretty much seen them all. Skyrim has tried to correct this somewhat, adding flavor to most of the dungeons in order to make them unique, but it can get tiring once you've faced the same enemy 70 times.

Combat in this game is the best in the series. Third camera mode is actually viable, and while you cannot pick classes in the previous games like you used to, you can now level up freely by gathering enough skill levels, with enough skills for you to be able to create a specific, personalized character.

While this deep personalization remains in Skyrim, some aspects such as spellmaking and custom enchantment creations are completely gone. While some may say this is to avoid your character being a fearsome god of destruction, Skyrim almost makes it too easy for you to do this anyway, allowing even the strongest opponents to fall easily.

This includes dragons. Before Skyrim released, Bethesda made it seem dragons were the most fearsome thing on Nirn. And while the first few times you do get to fight them they will put a decent challenge, Bethesda's scaling works poorly to keep it that way as you level and gain vastly better gear. Add that to these encounters being quite common at times, they completely lose that "epic feel" of the fight and just become an annoyance, pure and simple. This wouldn't nearly annoy me as much as it does if it wasn't for the fact that other, clearly looking weaker wildlife found actually put up a better fight than the dragons do. A Shadow of the Colossus or Dragon's Dogma approach to these encounters would do the trick, as those by comparison make the dragon fights in Skyrim disappointingly shallow.

While the main quest for this game is mostly horrid, it is the sidequests that offer the most enjoyment. The Daedra quests are especially great. As with the previous games, factions such as the Dark Brotherhood can be joined, and through their storyline, you will eventually rise through their ranks. A minor detail that's bugged me since Oblivion is that these factions never take into account your actual skill levels. Suppose you'd join the Mages College in Winterhold, and the teachers may comment on your great talent, but really, they're just commenting on your lack thereof. You can fully complete its storyline, clearly aimed for mages, having no magic skills at all. I know Daggerfall's old by now, but even there they would check your skills to see if you were a suitable character to join their organization. Why did they not keep this in subsequent games?

While these games can be extremely immersive, sometimes that immersion can be broken at times, either by bugs, which will always be present in such a gargantuan beast of a game, or by AI repeating the same lines over and over, notably the guards' comments when you approach them. It could be worse though, no longer will you find the world of Tamriel only having 5 voice actors working on it so there are still improvements. The graphics as well. Skyrim is simply a beauty to behold.

Last, and by no means least, the modding community. They have always been a staple in the series since Morrowind, adding hours of playtime to these games. Skyrim has not changed in regards to this, and it fact made mod installation easier thanks to its addition to the Steam Workshop. Find a mod you like? Just hit that subscribe button and open the launcher to see the game download it automatically. It's ridiculously simple, and you'd be silly not to give some of the fantastic mods already released a go. It's almost a sin to want to buy the console versions, due to what they miss on. These are the kinds of games that, 10 years down the road, with their DLCs fully released, will still have people modding them, and that is quite special.

All in all, I say Skyrim is a must-have for anyone with a remotely passing interest in the series. It's just that good. Complete with a deep customization, great setting, believable world and endless potential. Make sure you have a lot of spare time, this game will soul trap you for a long time, and you will more than likely thoroughly enjoy it, as I have.