Recent reviews by Darkelth

Played Dragon Age: Origins autumn 2011 for the first time, played a rogue back then. Now, had a second play-through as a mage, this time including all the DLCs. One reason is that I now finally have all the DA:s to play through, so had to start with this one.

Playing as a mage is most entertaining, I must say. For me, the game has grown old in a good sense, that is, it has not become that much worse as the time has passed. Although this reviewer never had played the subsequent Dragon Ages for comparison. Some hiccups were present. Every now and then the game started to crash, doing it all the time when you load the save. The trick is to verify the game files once again, and then it starts running again. The camera angle gets stuck sometimes, often in a quite irritating angle.

I remember that the game was at least marketed to be the successor of the original Baldur's Gate Duo. It never was that good, especially the lore is less entertaining (but BGs are already based on a known fantasy world, Forgotten Realms, so the comparison is not always fair. The same can be said concerning the Witcher, which is based on and inspired by absolutely magnificent novels!). The lore is still there and good enough, and there are multiple different story lines which you can take, so role-playing is possible.

Worth to play, if you aim to play through the series, would not perhaps recommend at least eagerly otherwise. Got a bit bored with the DLCs, Awakening and Witch Hunt are the important ones. The other ones, maybe excluding Leliana's story, are more or less worthless in my opinion. All in all, good ol' Bioware (though not as good as BG).

Still coming back as a casual player after over a decade of grinding. First came up with Trackmania Nations somewhere around 15 years ago in a LAN, was introduced as a "modern arcade STUNTS," which I used to play as a kid in the 90s. Got hooked, and played every now and then.

Had some break, then continued with Nations Forever. Then, when my old rig crashed I was without a PC for some years, now, with a new PC I happen to download the game again and continue the grind. Although it may be a curse word, I play the game as casual game, that is, open it every now and then and grind for a while and then quit. And the loop just goes on. The best racing game I've played.

I have played Action Half-Life 2 -mod before in LAN-environment and a bit also online, when it was still under development. Tried this in a LAN-party too. Really messy in the end. It was fun for some twenty minutes. Weapon balance was what it was. I'd give it most one go as the last game of the day, when everyone are laughing at any time. In any other situation, I do not know whether it is worth the try.

I finished the game years ago. After I finished Witcher 2, I talked with my wife about the novels. She wanted to read them with me. After she read them, she got hooked and insisted that I would play the games with her, so that she can watch while knitting. What could be better way to have some quality time with wife?

I remember from my previous playthrough, that the combat system was ♥♥♥♥♥♥ as hell. This time I think I grasped it, and it was not as bad as I remembered. Don't know why. After reading the novels, I did enjoy the storytelling even more than in previous playthrough, because one could spot many allusions and hints to the original novels. At the same time, the story was different, but bits and pieces were used and recycled in different characters.

Unfortunately I did choose the same side than in my first playthrough also this time. This means, that there are many choices that affect the game and story, which is really nice.

Although it might be hard to be accustomed to the combat system, which is old in comparison to the one in Witcher 2 (haven't played Witcher 3 yet, because my old rig can't process it), I still highly recommend playing the game in order to enjoy the whole story. It is worth it. And read the novels!

I had played through the original Witcher (Enhanced Edition) a couple of years ago and was fond of its mature world, choices that matter, the storyline - though not so much fond of its engine and playing system (controls, fighting system). Especially the fighting system was horrible, I never grasped it.

After a couple of years of waiting in my Library - because i had many other games on the i-need-to-play-this-first -list - I finally decided to give the second game a try. And I got immediately caught. I managed to use the old save file from the first game, which had some effects also on the second game.

The story continues to be, well, nothing compared other games, perhaps BG series coming near. But this is the best story line so far, which is understandable because it is based on actual novels. The game itself satisfies more and the fighting system is well improved. After one playthrough I'm thinking whether I should take another or not, which I haven't done with long role-playing games since Tales of Symphonia, the original six Final Fantasies and Baldur's Gate I and II.. That tells a lot. I made really hard choices and it would be interesting to see how the game develops if one chooses otherwise.

I'm now waiting to get my hands on the third game. Unfortunately my old rig (Phenom I Black Edition, 2,5Ghz Quad Core) is too ♥♥♥♥♥♥ to run it. So I need to wait some more...

I highly recommend playing this game, even though you haven't played the first game, or you have played just the third. Of course the story is more enjoyable if you play the first game first.. But I understand people skipping it because the fighting system was... horrible. Also, read the novels.

Nice Half-Life 2:ish linear and scripted FPS with fantasy elements. In the end it becomes a little bit too repetitive and thus more boring. The story line carries over the dull moments. I did not see much bugs mentioned in the reviews from the period of game's actual release. I had had the game on my Game Library for many years, but now eventually I decided to give it a try at last, and was worth the time. I finished the game within a couple of days.

The game's melee fighting system was first of its kind and very sophisticated, better for example than of The Witcher 1.

Some remarks of critique. The choices one makes could have had a huger impact, but thinking of the post-HL2 time it was released, multiple choices still is worth, maybe of an another playthrough. The ending was a bit dissapointment. It was short and a bit "flat" after all the big expectetions one had built during the playthrough.

Nevertheless, I recommend this a bit old game for all enthusiastics. It took ~16 hours to go through for me.

Payday reminds me a lot of Left4dead serie in a positive sense. As a 4-player co-op it is again a game that I can recommend for everyone who can get a couple of friends to join the game.

There are not so many games that really demands one into team-oriented play. AirBuccaneers is one of those diamonds. Ludocraft's old Unreal Tournament 2004 mod has got its facelift.

Although a bit rusty from the edges, the basic gameplay in AIrBuccaneers is worth it. Two teams, Vikings and Buccaneers are battling for the domination of the air space with different kind of balloons differing from little kamikaze ones to big battleships and floating bases.

For a new player it can be a bit hard to get into the game, though compared to the old mod, AirBuccaneers is much more gently. There isn't really a game like AirBucs, especially in terms of gameplay.

There's perhaps only two flaws in the game, for me at least. One is the not-so-big player population. But, eh, that can be fixed, because AirBuccaneers deserves more players. The second flaw is a bit clumsy melee action, but one can live with it.

I recommend this game for everyone from the bottom of my heart!

Update 2022: Just had a small LAN-party of 6 people playing for 1,5 days. The most played game was AirBuccaneers, which I wanted to introduce to the new players. It took around 10 minutes to get a hang of the game, of course with a little help from my part as an old "veteran," if I may say so. The game was enjoyable, as we had 2 against 4 (since I knew the game well) with one big ship being steered by bot engines.

When talked afterwards, one could say that with 4 players it is enough, but not good, with 6 it is enjoyable, and over 6 it becomes great. Of course if one would have at least 16 players, 8 in both teams, that would be something awesome.

So, if you are interested in LAN-game that is not that basic FPS (CS, Quake-clones etc), I really recommend downloading the game and experimenting with it. It is still fairly simple, just give half an hour to it before you throw it away!

I would, for my part, want to bring the old sunday/weekend 1-2 hour game sessions back to life, but one would need a community for it.

If you're into games with huge stories, Mass Effect serie shouldn't fail you (though I haven't played yet the sequel 3, which ending has raised much criticism). With the possibility to import your character from Mass Effect, ME 2 continues to build a huge story that catches the gamer immediately from the beginning.

If you have some friends to play with, APB Reloaded gives one many hours of great gameplay. Unfortunately some decisions from the developers give a hint that developers' name "Gamersfirst" leads to a false point of view.