Recent reviews by 彼岸凤凰

Running this on a 1070 with an i7 and it runs smooth for the most part. I get the feeling this is less of a game and more of an experiance because for the first 20mins you barely have control over the character. As an experiance so far it's amazing, with headphones on it is borderline disturbing with the many voices encouraging and insulting you as you play it. The voice work is also amazing, but this is where my problem comes with it as a game. Notice how everything I am praising has very little to do with gameplay.

Thats because as a game so far it's mediocure; combat is ok, level design so far is linear in the negative sense and the only real thing gameplay wise to make me think oooo cool is the puzzles. Maybe my feelings will change as I get further in, but right now I recommend it highly as an interactive movie and i don't recommend it as a game.

In a year that bought so many good MP FPS, this game has no business existing. The controls feel clunky and awkward when compared to just about every other shooter this year. Even Paladins, a free to play title, feels more satisfying than this games multiplayer.

As for the single player; the computer wants to control the game too much. Whether its aggressive aim assist even when turned off or auto flight when locked on in air combat, this game seems to find new ways to be that friend who says 'I'll just help you get passed this bit'.

The graphics and performance is all over the place too; certain textures are just low res garbage that is mixed in with amazing ones, the game decides it needs to load mid level on my 970 despite running at a mostly smooth 60fps. I have also run into a weird 'VAC' error that apparently was happening in Ghosts but is still happening and it stops you from entering in MP without a restart.

In summary the Single Player is pretty much press x to win, and the multiplayer is the worst fps mp i have played this year. Do yourself a favour and buy overwatch, play paladins, buy titanfall 2, any shooter but this one.

Worth the 30mins to an hour it will take you to finish it. The setting is believable and creates real tension. The story is coherrant and interesting. Although there are a few bugs that threaten to break the immersion (the torch you unlock is held the wrong way, and you caste no shadow but the objects you hold do). It can be difficult to spot what you can interact with and what you can't which can lead to some of the puzzles taking longer than they should to solve. Anyway give it a go, it's free and you have nothing to lose.

-:Updated 13th September to reflect 100%ing it:-

From the moment you start this game you can tell where it gets its inspiration and thats the games of Rare in the 90s. From the cute nonsense babbling characters to the light sense of humour, this is a love letter (no pun intended) to the likes of Banjo and so far I love it. The first world is brimming with charm; from the boxes that follow you around and welcome you to the little cars you can drive. I always think that you can tell the quality of a 3D platformer by how much you want to just forget about the point of it and explore, and this one had me doing it from the start (which is frustrating that it starts with a locked in tutorial).


Amount of content -

1x Hub World
3x Quest Worlds

Each world will take you around 2hrs minimum. I think most people will play it for between 8-10hrs and it took me 16hrs to 100% it. There is enough content to warrent the asking price, especially when you consider that the quest worlds are considerably bigger than a level in a game like Banjo.

Gameplay -

On the surface this is a collectathon like Mario64, Banjo etc, but it is not just copying them and I love the fact that it is also trying to bring something new to the table, which comes in the form of the unbox mechanic. This allows you to jump up to 6 times without landing, enabling crazy big jumps. The game suggests your health is connected to the unbox mechanic, however there are very few things that actually make you lose health which for me does diminish the excitement of it by the end.

Another way in which it builds on the platformers it takes inspiration from is the amount of character interactions. Not only are their quests to find, but people to talk to about the world you are exploring adding further flavour to the world you are tumbling through.

The difficulty of the game is similar to the likes of Banjo with a mixture of stupidly easy to more fiddly tasks. However the tone of the game gives you the feeling of relaxed fun even when trying to judge the gap between two distant boats you want to jump to.

Finally there is the customisation of your plain brown box. Completing the tasks and parts of the story lead to customisation unlocks which means you can turn your boring packaging into a weird bounding wonder. So if definining the protagonist your way is important to you then it is there and it is easy to do (you just need to find the tailor, which took me about 10mins after the first island unlocks).

Graphics and Technical Stuff.

The graphics are a mixed bunch with a combination of some great water textures and rock textures combined with some very plain ones mixed in, which works for the most part but at times can seem a little strange (watch the video above and you will see what i mean). However I found its short comings did not hinder the gameplay, which based on the first world I love.

It has an uncapped framerate and on my 970 rig will all settings maxed I was getting around 100fps at 1080p and there were no noticable major dips or stuttering. You can adjust things like FOV if you want and I know this is an important issue for some.

I would like to note that the game did crash for me while I was messing with the settings, but I suspect this was my firewall, because when I logged back in I had to allow the game access to areas my firewall didn't auto allow. After this initial crash I had no other bugs or crashes playing the game, however there was a little screen tearing which was largely removed by uncapping the framerate (others have suggested turning on vsync in your GPU control panel).

Controls -

How the character controls is important in a platformer as much as any other and I found the controls to be good; although controlling an object with sharp corners meant I needed a few moments to get to grips with how the box handles (because it does handle like a box and not like a ball). The vehicle controls do feel a bit looser and I am not sure how much that is me or the game.

The developers recommend a controller and because it is a 3D platformer I would agree, however I found it perfectly playable with WASAD and a mouse (mouse controls the camera and unbox mechanic while keyboard is used to move jump and interact). I could not get my DS4 to work with it natively, if that is how you like to game. However it worked great with my Xbox Elite and its paddles.

One issue I forgot to mention when I reviewed this initially was the fact that the controls are not customisable. So if that is a major issue for you, then you will need to take that into consideration.

Multiplayer -

This is local only and while it looks fun from YouTube videos I never had a chance to play it.

For Parents -

There is nothing in this game that would not be suitable for children of any age. The fact that enemies do not damage you, (only push you flying into the air and into the water grrr) and the fact that all enemies are boxes make it very kid friendly. Humour and tone has some more mature ideas but there is nothing sexual or particularly violent underpinning this game.

Overall-

All in all, I think this is a great game and I love my time within it. It is the 3D platformer I have been waiting for and wet my appetite for Yooka next year.

Hope this review helps anyone trying to decide whether to buy it. My advice is watch the video above on the shop page, it really does give a very good idea of what you are buying.

This game melted my face and forced me to eat it!

On a serious note, it's fantastic; smooth frame rates and a nice feeling while going round the track. You are not ground to a halt if you hit the side, but the slow down will cost you valuable time. This game does not just hand over golds like a teacher in a school for the underprivaledged, nope it makes you work for them.

The career mode feels a little basic but there is a lot to it; time trials, races, lvl progression, ship and upgrade unlocks. The graphics are amazing in places but functional in others (the ships themselves are low on detail but they have a style to them that i like), and the sparks and effects just heighten a great sense of speed and flow through the race... well until you smash into a building on the first jump (yup I did that).

The Multiplayer works and I had 4 races with no problems; although I think it's P2P as I lost the host after 4 games. That said, it worked smoothly (even if I raced badly XD ) and was a blast. At the time of writing there were not many players, but hey its day one on a game that hasn't been hyped (but it should be, it is a solid title).

To sum up, if you like games like Wipeout, Extreme G or F-Zero then you will probably like it; I know I do.

This is a game at war with itself. It's a survival game... that gives you all the materials you need at your feet and thefore becomes a chore. It's a crafting game... with very few things actually worth crafting. It is an exploration game... whose gameplay loop makes you either stay near your ship due to harsh weather or makes you mine in one spot because the mineral deposits are as big as a house and all over the planet.

Despite the game seeming to try so hard to make me want to hate it, I actually enjoyed my time flying from planet to planet and seeing what wonders the algorithm could cook up, and even after 50hrs I was still finding things to make me want to look at another planet.

If this were an early access game with the price tag to boot I would be giving it much more praise. But as it stands I can only recommend it when the cost of the game has come down to realistic levels (ie. in line with Elite Dangerous or other survival early access games). It is a good foundation to build from, but as a full priced game it needed more polish.

Just make sure you are buying the game for what it is and not what the vertical slice promo videos are showing you and you might enjoy it like i did.

Boarderlands humour set to a Moba esque multiplayer and a singleplayer/Co-op mode that plays a lot like an MMO dungeon. Your screen will fill with so much colour that it might induce a state of fun and enjoyment.

Things you might want to know:-

No offline mode, but you can play alone with bots or do the story single player.
3 MP modes each with 2 maps
Around 9 Story missions with matchmaking if desired.
All later maps and characters coming to the game will be included in the base game.

It might not be to everyones taste, because it values team play and objective based gameplay over lone gun action. That said I enjoyed my 12hrs in the beta and the first 3hrs of the main game.

I'm coming to the end of my time with Dirt3. After 14hrs I have made it to the final season in the single player, and while I have enjoyed it, the game does start to drag a little towards the end in my opinion. So here is kind of what you get in the main campaign:-

4 Seasons
Made up of 4 Events
Each event is made up of between 4 and 8 races
Which can be broken down into between 1 and 4 heats

Then on top of that, do well and you can unlock further events for each of race types that make up a further 4 to 8 races each. It's a big game.

First thing you will notice is that it runs really well and looks beautiful. My 970 build could get 60fps on ultra in 2k easily and managed the same on 4k for a lot of the tracks. The handling is nice and the AI of the other cars is unpredicable making for some nice races. The 'intermediate' level can be too easy for most races, and even with my so-so driving skills I was able to get first in pretty much all races till I got to the 3rd season. That said there are plenty of options to increase the difficulty, by turning off various assists or choosing the 'advanced' difficulty. The other thing I liked was the variety of race types; from traditional rally to more circuit based racing.

The game is not without its faults. For me the large amount of events just starts to feel like padding, especially with events like Head to Head, where you have to finish 3 heats of the same track. Then there is the gymkana, which while fun a few times is hampered by the fact you can only really do 5 tricks. My main complaint is in the sense of progression the voice overs give you. You never get the feeling you are getting better as a driver, and they act like You Tube is the only way to improve your social network profile. They say You Tube so much I felt like they were a sponsor of the game.

That said the downsides never got in the way of my enjoyment and I do recommend buying it if you like driving games. In terms of scores (if you like that kind of thing) it would probably get an 8/10 from me.

It's quite simply breath taking. The graphics, while not industry leading, portray the world and its characters exceptionally. The story shows great depth without actually uttering a single word. The gameplay is fantastic and AAA titles should take note on how to tell a story without relying on it and letting it overshadow the game. This is a masterpiece of level design and storytelling.

Magical 10/10

Was going to stop when I reached 250,000g, but somewhere after that I fell off the wagon and ended up farming the crafting materials to add a sprinkler system for two more large fields. If this game gets its hooks in you, it has hard to get the out.

Technically it works well also, only ever had it crash on me once when I tried to buy seeds in bulk. Soundtrack is nice, with different tunes of each season. Variety is amazing for what it is, crafting system, combat system, relationship system; this game gives you alot of things for the asking price.