Recent reviews by Cody48er

In-progress-update, 2024/05/06:
Initial response from Sony has rolled back on the mandated PSN account linking. This is a fantastic change and the way it should stay; That said, at time of writing sales of the game has still been revoked numerous countries where PSN accounts are inaccessible. Once this is rolled back it will be a net-zero and I will consider my recommendation neutral.

If coming updates can improve quality of the game itself and reverse course on adding more bugs than are fixed within a given update, and get back in line with beneficial balancing of new weapons on launch---as well as adjustments to older weapons that aren't largely nerfs after a new pass releases---Then I will happily flip my recommendation back to a positive.

There is a great foundation for the game here, with lots of potential enjoyment to be had. But haphazard updates doing things like punishing shooting armored targets, while having hardly any personal weapons that can consistently punch through armor...with the penalty being "Haha you and all your friends get randomly TK'd by ricochets and shrapnel", just isn't my idea of "fun" gameplay tweaks/balance.


Original review:
What was initially a fun game with a number of overlookable bugs and balance quirks, has only repeatedly left with worse impressions as continued updates change aspects of the game.

From retroactive "balance" patches nerfing our outright BREAKING balance and function of weapons to the point of being unusable unless you hate yourself and your friends; To releasing notably 'powerful' "Battlepass" weapons, only to nerf or tweak them downward after a new pass launches.

To what is now the most notable debacle of Sony forcing account linking with PSN services---a function that has been skippable since moments after launch and only after this notice of a requirement, has Sony changed their own ToS from account linking being "optional on PC games" to "required in some games".

Well? I have a PSN account, it's quite old, dating back 15+ years to PSP/PS2 forum days and such...But I can't access it; Multiple hacks to PSN services have put my rarely used account in a "Mandatory reset" status--of which it either fails to send a reset email, or fails to accept my DoB/security code. Initial contact of Sony's support has left me SoL due to this PSN account not having any sort of payment history/recent purchases, linked active payment method, nor personal ID linked with it.

So, if I wasn't already frustrated with the slew of bugs and haphazard balancing issues that the game incurs with each noteworthy patch...I'm pretty much locked out of playing regardless, unless I elect to make a burner email and create a new PSN account just to play this game. So, Thanks, Sony. And frankly, the attitude of the devs and their Community Manager team has really soured the perspective on the game as a whole, after severely poor responses to criticism and community feedback.

Very solid card-game-them-up with story and progression that throws new mechanics at you with some regularity.

As someone who's not really into the typical CCG genre, Inscryption does enough things differently to keep it very engaging and not TOO penalizing to be a turn-off if you aren't skilled in the genre. A bit of RNG involved at times as with any CCG, but it provides the player enough tools to overcome opponents so as to not be a 'brick wall' of skill-checks and 'perfect deckbuilding'.

Very interesting visual style and plenty of wild combinations along the way that make it a super fun experience. Also offers a couple options if you'd prefer to cheese the battles to progress the story along. ;)

A good premise, with good art and characters...Let down by a number of unfortunate short-comings and general "Really, what were they thinking" elements. I love Lab Zero, but I just can't recommend someone spend their time on this.

Pros:
-Generally good platforming and technical, skill/ability based progression. First time through new areas is fresh and fun.
-Fun characters and interactions
-Fantastic animations and art
-Solid soundtrack that carries the theme well

Cons:
-Lackluster story. It's serviceable, but very run-of-the mill and often doesn't provide reasoning for anything. Characters join just because.
-Somewhat wonky progression. Can't get past an area? Well go do some unrelated other stuff, come back, and suddenly the character decides "Yeah, I should have that ability now" and just learns it on the spot. Alrighty then...
-Frequent backtracking through areas metroidvania-style to access a new area. But there aren't many quick-access points and often you'll run through a vast level to get to the next corner you unlocked. And that's not even touching on the (optional) quests which require even more excessive running around (Go to place A, get told you need to check out B, C and D, often in completely other 'worlds', etc)
-Combat ultimately gets very repetitive. While the large roster of characters bring unique abilities and the idea of combos/juggling and switching up on enemies..By the half way point, there's virtually no finess or challenge to it. Some enemies are tankier, but often you can just go all-out with your attacks and "brute force" anything down---often before the enemy even attacks back.
-Worse yet, that applies to bosses.. Yes, there are full on bosses in the game you can just knock down without ever putting up a fight.


There are a few other general issues I'm sure you'll find in other reviews, and I really could go on about minor complaints. Overall it's not that I found any bugs, nor that I didn't like the general premise or involvement in the game...But it just didn't really leave an impression of wanting to come back to it after a session. I stuck it out mainly for the fun characters and interesting environments, but the combat and story were a let-down.

So with that, as much as I hate to say it, I just can't honestly recommend someone take the 20-25 hours or so out to play through this game as it stands.

First up: If you liked the first Beat Hazard, stop reading and just buy this. You won't be disappointed.


Beat Hazard 2 picks up where it's predecessor left off and improves upon literally every aspect of it. More ships more weapons, more bosses, bigger visuals, improved sound effects, and more accessibility to ANY music playing on your system... It is a full on upgrade that won't disappoint.

So what IS it? It's what happens when you decide to take your WinAmp visualizer (am I old yet?), load it into the barrel of a gun and start playing a crack-infused game of Asteroids. Twin stick bullet hell, fueled by just how much noise you can ram through your speakers.

With it, comes a respectable array of special weapons & powerups tons and TONS of different ship designs with varying control characteristics, primary weapon fire patterns and abilities. Random (?) ship generators are here to offer you a new unique ship as a reward for completing songs and challenges, and you never know what you'll get---From a hulking gun platform juggernaut, to literally a mosquito that can dodge everything while boasting a meager pea shooter.


So how's it fueled? With the new addition of an "Open mic" feature, and Song Detect/identifying, BH2 can listen in and pick up on literally any song playing on your computer. Be it from an Mp3 file locally, Spotify, YouTube, or just the music playing in your current Netflix binge session. Lock'n'load.

With that, comes the visual intensity and clever spawning of bosses and enemy swarms that sync up to how intense your music is. Big thundering orchestra with lots of action? Expect tons of enemies, missiles, asteroids and maybe even a boss or two. But when the chorus breaks and it's a low bridge? Hold out and survive with your trusty pea shooter as you fight your way through the residual enemies waiting for the beat to drop again and start blasting once more---After all, how much fire power you dish out is equally proportionate to how intense your music is blasting.

BH1 is one of my most played games on Steam and at the current pace, I can see BH2 clawing it's way up to a similar threshold. I love music, and being able to jam out to some killer visuals with near infinite replayability, that's how you keep me hooked.

Genuinely a love letter to the classic holy trinity of Ace Combat titles that, quite frankly, checked all the boxes needed to say "Yep, that's a damn fine AC game alright"...and have my grinning like a child on Christmas morning through damn near each and every mission.

Dang right I did! Did I enjoy the story? Yep! Got some feels in and emotional attachment this title's batch of cliche characters. So what if it's not the BEST story, or the BEST game in the series? It's incredibly true to it's roots and was EVERYTHING I expected and could have hoped for. This is the first game in a long time to have me grinning like a kid on Christmas because I'm just enjoying it so dang much.

Well, it's an arcade-styled 'jet combat game'. Meaning, it's Easy to pick up and play on a controller with no Military-grade flight training required. You fly jets and ya shoot things! Sounds good, right?

Take that easy-to-get-into gameplay, mash it together with some quirky, "anime-style" characters and diaglogue. Dramatic settings for each mission in an overarching "Global war" plot in an alternate universe; Engaging cutscenes that pull you into the characters, the game world, and set the scene for each battle YOU are about to take the key role in. Mix in some radio chatter to immerse you in the battle, and top it off with an incredible soundtrack that just makes every moment FEEL like something monumental...And you've got a recipe for this long-running franchise's claim to fame.

Missions that put you and your plane in places and situations that, let's face it, no one should ever be taking a plane, and tasking you to bring it all home in one piece. That's what we're here to do and it's your squad of misfits' job to turn the tides of a war seemingly without end.

IF you've never played the series, this game certainly makes a good "Starter pack" to show you everything Ace Combat is about in one tight, polished up package on a modern engine with stunning graphics. If you're a returning veteran, than you can rest assured that it's everything an AC title should be and I doubt you'll be disappointed.


||PS:And yes, at the time of writing, this game is being bombed with negative reviews over two or three main factors:
1) Lack of HOTAS support at launch [Some speculate to be a bug, others a lazy effort],
2) Certain "premium" PC user functions like Ultrawide support [Update: Folks over at the WSGF have a patch/tool out for Ultrawides!]
and
3) The limited console exclusivity of VR missions. [Supposedly coming to PC in a year]
Personally, AC has always been a controller game at heart, and growing up playing it on the PS1/PS2, that's where my loyalty lies; Finished the campaign with an Xbox One controller and couldn't be happier with it. It's not a simulator, so while Flightstick support would be nice, I don't feel it's mandatory.

One of the most genuinely interesting takes on an alt-future and thought provoking trips into an Earth that humanity is forced to leave behind.

Excellent 'hack-and-slash' style face-paced gameplay mixed up with a handful of weapon styles with somewhat varied move sets, further augmented by swappable character upgrade chips to tweak your playstyle more to your liking.

Backed by an intriguing and lore-filled wastelandish world inhabited by autonomous robots and Human-like Androids, left to pick up the pieces and carry on in a land left behind after humanity pillaged the last of it's usable resources. Left to rebuild in hopes of humanity's return, the androids are left to exterminate hostile threats as well as bring the planet back from the brink of desolation. While ultimately uncovering some dark secrets left behind in the years past of this ravaged landscape.

Nier:Automata is both a visual and auditory masterpiece in me eyes that built a fascinating world and left it for the player to uncover and learn it's secrets as you progress to learn of a unsavory past and question our own future. Rapid-fire, incredibly fluidly animated combat, several different cut-ins of varying types of gameplay from hack-and-slash to side scrolling SMUP all brought together by a stark backdrop of what remains of the planet. Beautifully enhanced by a masterful orchestral soundtrack cements together memorable experiences from throughout the game.

+1 to the very small list of "Games I've requested a refund for".

It's perhaps not bad if it's your first fighter, but honestly it's so bare-bones it's just not fun for more than what I would expect to be a couple hours. Even upping the difficulty, first time playing I got 3-4 perfect fights in a row in a half-drunk and tired state.

The standard animations are stiff as hell, nothing feels very fluid, which is an immediate red mark in a fighter. The entire character roster has literally 5 moves each--3 "Normal" moves and 2 Super (power charge) moves. That's it. 5 moves for I believe 12 characters. Straight up ad-nauseam if you intend to return to the game more than a few times...which you might, with nearly 50 achievements to it's credit.

The super moves are pretty and somewhat decently animated, but the rest is just very stiff and more like cardboard cutouts slapping against each other. Rather than pick this up, I'd whole-heartedly recommend playing Skullgirls, Guilty Gear, or BlazBlue any day of the week. They're the same price or cheaper, too, even with the low sale price I had bought this at.

Grand Theft Auto V: The greatest example of how to release an absolutely stunning, FANTASTIC game on launch day...And then completely muck it up with miserable post-launch decisions and greedy marketing. When your parent company flat out wants to squeeze every last dime out of it's daily player base as possible.


GTA V is one of my favorite open world games of all time. It's a beautiful, well crafted world with interesting SP missions and a functional (hic) online. That said, I bought this game knowing it would be modded like every GTA game has been for like 15 years. I also bought it on the basis of GTA Online being something I could play regularly and have decent progression and have a vain hope of unlocking content in without devoting my 24/7 life to grinding for money.


With the shoe horning of Shark Cards and an ENDLESS STREAM of supremely overpriced content online with little actual FUN content added to it, that makes me actually want to play it for fun rather than feel like I"m grinding for cash every waking minute...It completely ruined the experience of GTA Online. Who really wants to farm cash to blow $10M on an in-game car or plane? For reference, that's more than $100 USD--REAL WORLD MONEY-- worth of premium 'Micro'-Transaction shark cards if you wanted to just skip the time and buy a plane.

Pair that with the fact that there has not once been an update to GTA V's Single Player mode---More importantly, you can NEVER get the premium Online vehicles in Single player to mess around with and enjoy. The VTOL Hydra? Nope. All those amazing super cars? Nope. Low-riders and super bikes with boost? Nope. Rolling tank military SUVs delivered to your doorstep? Nope. None of it.

That was, until the glorious modding community came around and added all the best features and content of GTA Online, BACK into Single player for all of us to use. That was great! I could play the game the way I wanted, access all the content I've paid for, and I don't have to deal with online players destroying my vehicles if I don't want to.


...That is, however until the Corporate Overlords at Take Two Interactive decided to file a cease-and-desist claim against OpenIV, the primary crew that made modding GTA IV and GTA V possible. The best tool available to make all other mods compatible, and the very backbone of SINGLE PLAYER mods in GTA V.

Yes. Single Player. Despite their claims that OpenIV is 'allowing exploits into the GTA Online world', it is not. OpenIV has nothing to do with online; It it a closed-source software (So no one can exploit the reverse engineered software to hack the game illegitimately), and it even DISABLES itself if you go online. So none of your mods will carry over. They purposely built the utility to tick all the boxes and keep the software for single player use only. But that doesn't stop TTI from shutting them down on the basis of it being "Harmful to their online community".

Well, sorry to tell you, but the Online in GTA V is already a vile hell with a plethora of third-party hacks that have nothing to do with OpenIV--THOSE are the people that need to be getting cease-and-desist orders. Not the one team that did everything in their power to keep their tool on the up-and-up and appeal to Take Two/Rockstar's wishes for online to be *their* property with no outside mods.



***UPDATE June 23, 2017***
As of writing, it appears that Take Two have stepped down, at least to a degree, and that OpenIV is back in action and being updated. So, potential for modding may have returned.

That said, this review will remain negative due to the fact they not only TRIED to pull a massively anti-consumer practice and only turned around after massive backlash. But also the fact that the last two years since the game's release on PC have been nothing but endless efforts to add more and more costly updates to GTA Online, but they also have done nothing to support the Single Player. And as this recent debacle shows, they are actively trying to get people away from the Single Player and into GTA-O, because the SP doesn't net them a constant stream of microtransaction money.

Frankly, GTA Online is one of the worst grinds for content I've come across in recent years. Modding things into SP is the only way for many like myself, who have actual day jobs and responsibilities, to even access half of GTA 5's content in a reasonable time frame.

Gave this a go based on a random r/Vive recommendation. Was a little hesitant at the price ($25 at current sale price. Which breaks down to about $1/playable track, and 3 modes for each), but it's actually surprisingly fun.

This is a somewhat unique take on the "Hit beats in a VR Rhythm game" concept. In this, you fly through a tunnel that loosely follows where you swing your arms (It's not inaccurate, it's a buffer to make hitting the beats you want easier--which is a good thing). Rather than simple beats you 'Punch' or 'Block', this features 3-4 different types of beats mixed together seamlessly:


1) Standard "Punch that as it comes at you" (Yellow)
2) Place your hand in the block's path and click the trigger at the perfect time (Green)
3) Hold the trigger and 'trace' the path of the block, while also hitting the above blocks as they come (Pink)
and 4) Special transition sequences where you hold the triggers and trace longer trails to the next part of the song (Star-Pink)

It sounds simple, but as with any rhythm game, there's always that difficulty curve. There are three difficulties, and based on the first 10 or so songs they are as follows:
1) Basic: Mostly consisting of simple hit blocks without a huge diversion to the pathing or many switch-ups
2) Medium: Adds all the main mechanics in frequency. Frequent switch ups, simultaneous presentation of all 3 main block-types (So you have to normal-hit blocks WHILE hit-and-click ones or hold-and-trace blocks fly at you too)
3) Hard: Which I have admittedly not tried at time of writing, but appears to be the above turned up to 11. Much faster, more blocks, more switch ups. Bring your A Game.


So with the mechanics in mind, there are 25 tracks in the game that can be played on all 3 difficulties. The individual challenge varies by track, and they all come with individual "Difficulty ratings", that adjust accordingly if you're playing on Easy/Medium or Hard. While there isn't an option to add user music currently, the built-in songs are actually quite fun and a very familiar style for Japanese-style rhythm games. I'd expect a decent amount of longevity if you try to master the Medium and Hard versions of tracks.

And lastly, the game is visually pleasing. Graphics are clean and well polished. Vibrant colors and somewhat unique world/level design in the background and hub world. So far, each song has had it's own somewhat unique background that matches the theme/tone of the song nicely, and the motion ramps up as the song plays (Similar t a visualizer, but it's the actual environment changing up). Oh, and you're flying along side an Anime Girl as you fight the music to rebuild damaged parts of the world. So, that's kinda cool. :P


Overall, it's a fun experience that gets you moving and admittedly requires a little bit of mental gymnastics to tackle the mixed hit styles all at once. Easy to pickup, difficult to master as they say. With enough variety and fun gameplay to keep it interesting, as long as you're fine with the use of original songs, it should be a quality buy..

A sink-or-swim test of your VR legs and endurance.

Windlands is a tricky test of your Spiderman skills while plotting a route through it's pleasantly vibrant world using Grappling hooks and a bit if crafty platforming. Offering a good balance of difficulty and just high-speed swinging action, while you hurl yourself toward the next collectable to unlock new and varying worlds to explore.

That said, if you aren't good with motion sickness, the game will likely throw you off balance and have you falling about while adjusting to the speed of movement and locomotion. It's not a bad system by any means, but can be unforgiving to new VR users.