Recent reviews by baaa

Definitely one of the better retro-style shooters I've played!

Doesn't settle for just the basic retro-shooter gameplay either, it crams in a ton of stuff: upgrades for your weapons, upgraded augments for your body, built-in micro-missiles which are incredibly satisfying to use, air dashing, double jumping, wall running, a grappling hook, sliding into enemies with your chainsaw leg, collecting secrets... there are even a couple of vehicle sections but those aren't that good compared to the rest of the game.

Really liked the variety of weapons and the different fire modes, the first pair of pistols you start with are useful for the entire game because of their secondary lock-on mode that can insta-kill a group of lower tier enemies no matter where you aim, and every weapon has its uses.

I also can't get enough of games with this kind of freedom of movement, once you unlock air dashing + double jumping + wall running + wall jumping it's very very fun to play.

Ridiculously addicting

A fantastically fun game. I've played it through about 6 times in a week so far because the gameplay is so good I don't mind repeating things. The weapons are all useful at different times, throwing and then shooting dynamite to blow enemies up never gets old, and most of the levels are really well-designed and reward exploration.

The only real complaint I have is that it's not longer, looking forward to episode 2!

A really really fun retro-style FPS. The basic gameplay/combat is very addictive and satisfying when you have good weapons to play with! I've put about 27 hours into it so far in a little over a week, and have only just finished my first playthrough. There's a lot of content here! The partially randomised weapon drops and level designs keep you interested and the constraint of only keeping 1 weapon as you go from level to level encourages you to experiment with new ones you pick up to see what works best. There are some great rare weapons: mini-nuke launchers, orbital lasers, pirate cannons, black hole launchers... and when you get double-jumping + air dashing + a grappling hook it gives you all kinds of options for getting around.

My main gripe is that there are no less than 3 levelling-up systems that you really need to use to give yourself an easier time of things, but unlocking anything in these systems requires playing one of 3 mini-games inside the main game: a Mario-style platformer, a side-scrolling space shooter, and a 2D RPG-type thing. These can be difficult/frustrating to play, especially the platformer, and it didn't feel particularly clear to me how to actually use some of the things you can unlock (some things need to be "equipped" while others don't). There's also an infinite-enemies arena mode which you have to play to earn resources to spend in one of the mini-games. I appreciate the effort that's gone into all this but it's not something I really liked having to spend time on vs the main game. Apparently you can turn the minigames off but I didn't notice that option until I was almost done with my playthrough and I'm not sure what happens with the progression systems if you do that.

That said I'd still recommend this if you like Dusk or Amid Evil or Ultrakill or Ion Fury!

Edit: have now played this for a somewhat crazy 80+ hours and completed 4 full playthroughs. I can't remember the last time I finished any FPS and immediately started playing through it again, much less doing it 4 times - it's such an addictive game! You wouldn't think so on first playing it, but I think the combination of really satisfying combat + relatively short levels + fast loading times + simply pressing 'e' a couple of times to start a new level makes it very easy to just sit down and blast through a bunch of them in one go.

Pleasantly surprised by how good this game was! It really captured the same feeling I remember from the late 90s "Terminator Skynet", scuttling around in the rubble with robots stomping about and HKs buzzing overhead.

Liked:
- atmosphere/graphics/sound design/music
- progression/upgrades system and weapon customisation
- even a single Terminator can kill you in seconds if you're careless, you really do feel the danger they pose
- needing to acquire plasma weapons before you can even damage Terminators (being able to stun them briefly with a shotgun is also a nice touch)
- levels are almost always designed with multiple paths you can take (sneak vs fight etc)

Disliked:
- some of the side missions end up feeling a bit silly given the serious tone of the game: you're supposed to be fighting to save humanity but this kid wants you to stop by his old house and find a box of chalk for him while you're at it? Sure, you're free to ignore them, but objectives that were tied in to the main story would have been better
- it would have been nice to have another 1-2 missions towards the end after you unlock the 2nd gen plasma weapons! It's a lot of fun to suddenly be able to mow down Terrminators but you don't get as much time as I'd hoped to enjoy that
- some cliched/annoying characters and a lot of back and forth fetch questing

Definitely recommended!

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Edit: have now played the DLC too and I think it's better than the main campaign despite being shorter. Much more "shooty" vs "talky" which I personally like, and you actually get some relatively helpful AI companions a lot of time. Plus some more tie-ins to T1/T2.

This is a definite return to form after Sam 3. That game just didn't feel as fun and over-the-top as the previous games and I've never been tempted to replay it.

Sam 4 is fantastic: stupidly large numbers of enemies at the same time, stupidly destructive weapons and powerups (e.g. the black hole grenade that sucks every enemy in the area into it), stupidly large boss aliens, impressive graphics/sound effects, no attempt to be realistic/serious whatsoever, and a fairly long campaign with optional side missions that gain you extra weapons/gadgets. Firing a minigun into a horde of oncoming enemies for 30+ seconds straight never gets old, and they've tweaked some existing weapons with useful alt-fire modes too. You can headshot most enemies for extra damage now which I think is new, and you even get semi-useful AI companions at times.

Unlike Doom 2016/Doom Eternal where you really have to play a certain way to survive, here you have much more freedom to just use whichever weapons you want and have fun. I liked the recent pair of Doom games too but Serious Sam is a bit less fast paced and doesn't rely so much on up-close combat. You can do melee attacks but you usually won't want to in the middle of a horde!

Finally there's also a surprisingly good storyline which can often be quite funny and is as silly and off the rails as the rest of the game.

Probably a good buy if you enjoyed games like Dear Esther, Firewatch, or What Remains of Edith Finch.

Lots of walking around listening to dialogue, no jump scares or action, just gradually unravelling a mystery while also learning more about the character you're playing.

Plus points: good voice acting, absorbing plot, and it takes full advantage of the Unreal Engine to create some incredible scenery and weather effects - never seen a game so accurately capture standing inside looking out at the rain through a window.

Negative points: no real puzzles or problem solving beyond walking to different places and clicking on various objects to trigger actions, so if you enjoy that sort of thing it might get a little boring. It's also not a long game, took less than 3 hours to play through the whole thing. Paying full price I'd have felt a bit annoyed, but as I got it at 50% off in the Xmas sale it was better value.

Excellent fast-paced retro-style FPS! Surprisingly lengthy too - apparently took me about 8 hours for a full playthrough on normal difficulty, with zero effort to go hunting for the dozens of secret areas scattered around most levels. Nice variety of weapons and almost all of them stay useful for the whole game. Has a minimal plot but that's not a bad thing at all in a game like this, you don't want to waste time watching cutscenes or reading messages when you could be shooting something instead!

A pretty decent retro-style FPS and very cheap in the current sale! If you like Serious Sam/Dusk/DOOM you'll probably like this too. There is some kind of story going on but you can completely ignore it and not miss anything, it all boils down to "shoot lots of robots" in the end anyway.

Having now finally played the full game start to finish, I have very mixed feelings. It looks great and obviously feels much more like a modern game than HL1, and in the Black Mesa facility sections they've usually done a good job of tweaking the level design and gameplay to make it better than the original or to make the architecture more realistic. The weapons are pretty faithful to the original with some small changes, but I don't understand why they changed the SMG so much (reduced max ammo, reduced accuracy etc) - it doesn't feel as useful as it should.

Xen is the part I really have a problem with. I played the beta a while back which included the first chunk of it, and that seemed OK. But the full Xen section goes on and on and on and on and is really not fun to play. The few minutes of solid action fighting the Gonarch (big spider) in HL1 instead becomes a stupidly long period of getting chased down endless tunnels - clearly influenced by the antlion tunnel level in one of the HL2 episodes - before the game finally decides it's time to allow you to actually kill the bloody thing, and reverts to the HL1 level layout. The "Interloper" chapter is just plain bad. So many puzzles involving standing on moving crates or shooting weird blobs on the walls, occasionally allowing you to shoot an actual enemy to stop you falling asleep. I'd actually prefer to play HL1 Xen over BM Xen after experiencing both.

Overall I think it's worth playing for the Black Mesa chapters, but if you aren't enjoying Xen after the first 10-20 minutes then just stop, it doesn't get better.