Recent reviews by JustMyke

For a short prologue to the ultimate fan-driven Half-Life 3, it ain't too shabby. I struggled a bit with some visual ghosting (likely a combination of my PC specs and the Unreal Engine), but it didn't take too much away from my experience. Weapons felt as expected for a game set in the Half-Life universe. It's admittedly a strange, but neat addition bringing some of the source engine trappings into Unreal Engine as fans of the series have grown familiar with them for 20 years. Like others, I do like the motif of this version of Ravenholm taking place in a sort of dream or limbo state where parts of The Borealis blend in with the aging wood of the once-thriving mining town, starting with the arctic atmosphere.

Speaking of the ship, it appears toward the end of the prologue as an exit, and the door opens where Father Grigori once emerged. The ladder extends down so the player can reach it.

I'm excited to see a game that Valve neglected to make for 20 years coming to fruition, even if it is an interpretation of what could have been. This will be the most polished interpretation of Half-Life 3 I've seen yet.

It would have made more sense to develop for Source or the later-released Source 2, but this shows what fans can achieve with a different, more powerful engine from another company.

It's not lost on me that Unreal inspired Half-Life, so let's call this a full circle.

This game possibly has one of the most passionate player bases I've ever seen of any game so far. Even going as far as to get Sony to back off with the PSN thing, after they let their voices be heard within a week of Sony announcing they were going to move forward with it. One week. The developers even encouraged them to do it. Democracy is strong with this one.

Rest assured, if you're worried about Sony having dug their nasty fingers in the proverbial pie, the fans and the developers are actually on the same page -- they'll fight the threat to the fan base off in any way they can. If you've put the game down because of the announcement of the PSN invasion, pick it back up because democracy has prevailed. Whatever they were planning on, it's been reduced to an optional linking step under Options > Account.

If you don't have one, you can still dispense managed democracy without a Sony/PSN account, so get back in there Helldivers!

Serious Sam 3: BFE (Before First Encounter) is not just a bad Serious Sam game -- it's a failure in game design. I don't say that a lot about a video game, but this one sure took the cake. It'll throw everything at you and expect you to go the mile. You're going to be seeing Kleer Skeletons and the bull monsters a lot later in the game.

This was hell to play through, on Normal. I can't imagine playing through this game on the Serious or Mental difficulty. At that point, you might as well bend over, hug your cheeks, and kiss your ass goodbye.

I find it unsurprising that only 8% of the install base earned the achievement for playing through the campaign. And I'm part of that 8%. I need a beer.

Far Cry 5 changed the way it plays a bit and it's glorious. More importantly, gunplay has been changed -- bullets are projectiles, so now it takes actual skill to kill your enemies. Joseph Seed is also a great villain. He's easily one of the best villains of the series, up there with Vaas from Far Cry 3!

If you're into the whole Souls-like genre and you want a bit of Science Fiction thrown into the mix, what better game to start with than The Surge? There are a few additions made to make the experience a little more tolerable, but I won't describe them here. Play the game if you want to learn more.

I'll keep this short by suggesting that if you loved playing the original Half-Life, you will come to appreciate what this game has in store. And as of publishing this review, they're nearing completion of the Xen chapters, playable through the public-beta branch!

Looking at game-play footage of this game, I was given hella "EA Skate" vibes, and that enticed me to buy it. I went in thinking I'd be playing it casually, however, after playing it for as long as I did, the best way I can describe it accurately is if Skate wanted to be the next Dark Souls and wanted to kick you in the nuts repeatedly while it was at it. It even makes it clear upon launching that the game will be unforgiving, which disappointed me on a casual level. The controls are off-putting--triggers to steer/turn your skater in the air, left stick to control front foot and right stick to control back, etc--and customization--in its current form--is hideously limited as it gives you a generic Skater to play as. Until this game gives you the option to have Skate-like controls--which I prefer over this clunky mess--I won't be picking this up again anytime soon. I'd gotten a refund after playing the game for 83 minutes, 20 or so of which were most likely after I'd finished the tedious, bone-grinding difficult tutorial.

As it stands, I wouldn't get Session right now. First impressions are everything, and I was left with a bit of a sour taste just seconds into playing. I'd say give it a few months or so. If the game still isn't accessible for a casual audience by then, steer clear unless you want your face to meet with the pavement and run up that hospital bill.

I cannot recommend this game to the casual gamer, such as myself. That's not to say I didn't have fun with it. On the contrary. I got used to the controls, but I could not grind to save my life. That said, only the hardcore will flourish in this love letter "to the golden era of Skateboarding".

I found the writing to be very engaging and plot very interesting. I wholeheartedly enjoy the concept of branching paths, which this game exploits at its leisure. I became a hero in the end, thanks to my trying to talk a cult member out of a terrorist act and generally being your average joe. And, this should be no surprise to my friends, I gave in to Lucy's temptations, thanks to my weakness for foregin girls.

Unfortunately, since this is a text-based game we have here, I could only muster one playthrough. It doesn't help that it doesn't have a save game feature or chapter select. This is a picky comment, but it would've helped this game a lot and add some replay value if it had a little more meat to it, made this into a longer story. Then again, you can only stare at text on a screen for so long.

Regardless of my personal preferences, if you're looking for a game that's not at all asking for you to have the right graphics card and a story that's particularly engaging, I'd say this would be worth your time.

Just re-played the game this week, and I enjoyed almost every moment in it. If you're looking for a game that's dark and has that graphic novel-esque look, look no further than The Darkness II. I'm honestly kinda sad there was no DLC made specifically for this game for the duration of its release, despite there being a DLC option in the menus. This is just begging for a sequel. I want to see who the Darkness latches onto next.