Recent reviews by Deimos

A solid adaptation of the original game. Great UI/UX design, if you're familiar with the rules you can pick it up almost instantly. The art adaptation of all the cards is top-notch. Not to mention they're all animated! An easy recommendation.

A good adaptation of an amazing board game. if you like the original game and want a more accessible/online way to play it with friends or alone then I recommend this game.

My only gripe is the game feels really "stiff". The animation and UI elements specifically. With board games, trying to recreate that "tactile" feeling is hard with a digital adaptation and I think this adaptation did a mediocre job with it.

Awesome game and it feels criminal that it's free. I've mostly just played against bots on normal difficulty and this game is very entertaining for a quick 5-10 minute break to get off from work or whatever. My only critique is the music is kinda obnoxious, started the game and immediately dialed the music volume to 0 bruh. Again, awesome free game and you can get a lot of fun out of it alone or with friends.

A great adaptation to a great board game.

This adaptation is loyal to the original with its great art and added some clean effects which make the game feel very polished and well-made. The user experience is also seamless, it's easy to pick up for those who already know the game.

As someone who mostly plays against the PC, the AI is pretty good providing a decent challenge on the hardest difficulty. Recommended game.

One of the hardest games to review imo.

It's a good game don't get me wrong, the world is unique and the battle system is complex, but it's an overly masochistic game. You will have many many many runs before you can finally get into the late game. I'm 50+ hours in and haven't even reached a late-game crisis yet because my company keeps getting wiped out. Most of my time in this game is just starting a new campaign, hoping to get good stats on my initial bros, and hoping that I can survive the first two weeks or so in the game. Rinse and repeat.

Mind you, I love these types of 'losing is fun' games, such as Rimworld and Project Zomboid. These games are great because tragedy can give so much to a game's narrative. But losing in those games has never made me feel so frustrated, I'll just go 'Man, that was a good run'. But the pure randomness of BB just turns that whole narrative into something just completely not fun and annoying.

The combat system is run on a percentage system of hits. And this is something that is mostly out of your control. You can miss consecutive high-percentage hits. I've experienced missing very high percentage hits consecutively (on multiple different runs) which end up ruining all the time I've spent on that run. It feels terrible, It's not fun. Even with the best strategies, most of it just comes down to RNG. And the hard part of the aftermath is that it does not leave you wondering 'How can I get better' or 'What did I do wrong' since there isn't a lot you can do to mitigate your bad luck. Retreating or trying to strategize some desperate counter-attack is very hard once you've engaged with the enemies.

As I said this game isn't for everyone, even those who think they might enjoy it or is familiar to the genre, which is why I'm not recommending it. I honestly think this game could be more popular or have an 'overwhelmingly positive' review rating on Steam if the combat system gave us some way to counter the RNG system. I'm still going to play this game at least until I finished one late-game crisis out of spite lol. But the hours and hours that I've spent in this game just make me feel like that guy on the internet who reviews fast food, 'my disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined'.

Edit:
Beat the game at the 100th hour and I can say most of my opinions are the same. I only played LW (Lone Wolf) start which may have contributed to my staggering play-time to finish one campaign (or I just suck). I also might've misworded a couple of things, such as the combat RNG being out of your control. You choose your fights anyways.

But I do still think the game's utter zealousness and no-mercy attitude toward its game design is a turn-off for me. I wish they'd just tone it down a bit and make the game less grindy. Or at least make rebuilding after a loss less grindy. Losing a battle that you chose to engage in (and then retreating), surviving with less than handful of bros, and trying to recuperate from that is a total slug-fest. I honestly might as well restart the game, especially knowing that the game scales in difficulty with time and that there is a crisis coming sub-day 100.

BB has it all tbh. Good art, interesting combat, and I forgot to mention how amazing their writing is. Yet it is so balls-to-the-wall in trying to force its players to commit to this journey of learning by suffering. It's a shame to me. I really think this game has the potential to be one of those acclaimed 'overwhelmingly positive' games on Steam, but alas.

No game is perfect but CK3 is one of the easiest game to envision it being perfect. The framework is there, the potential has been achieved. It just needs that one extra step of detail-adding to make this game perfect.

Paradox franchises have redefined the Grand Strategy genre but what makes CK3 so unique is the game-generated stories of individual characters in its world. In Europa Universalis we see the rise and fall of nations. In Stellaris we see the rise and fall of multiplanetary civilizations. But CK3 is more intimate because individual rulers and their families are put in a much higher pedestal than the importance of the nation itself. Backstabbing, deposing of rulers, and dynasty shattering lands are a regular occurence in CK3. To me, this is what makes CK3 so unique.

The game has good mechanics and is given good amount of attention to each of them. Such as warfare, diplomacy, law, economy, and personality are all fleshed out in the game. But, in practice, they may seem unrealistic. Such as how easy and simplistic marriages are as if picking a spouse is choosing from a list from a dating app. There should be more consideration in marriages than simply garnering alliances or just trying to breed the best genes for your offspring. Maybe each party should get hooks on each other if both rulers are equal rank? Or if you are marrying from a family of lower tier, they get hooks on you but they give you instant bonuses such as gifts in gold, artifacts, or increase in taxes, levies, etc and vice versa.

Paradox is known to always improve and develop its released games for an extended amount of time. Just like CK2, so I'm excited to see what they have in store in the future, whether it's a free update or a DLC.

Overall 9.5/10

A good but forgettable city builder (in its current state).

First of all, the game has good art design. The villagers and architecture really adds to the world-building of the game, reminds me a bit of Nausica from Studio Ghibli. The diorama-like presentation gives a unique and easy-to-look-at perspective when playing the game.

Now, as a city builder, the game isn't much different from other city builders aside from the travelling titan (Onbu) that you rely on to live. The research tree is bare bones and the world map doesn't have much to it which should be a point of emphasis since the travelling Onbu is the selling point of this game.

But I did enjoy my 17 hours in game. Achieving 100 days and 100 pop after a couple tries and restarts after understanding the mechanics better. The graphics are eye candy and pace of progression is great unlike other city builders/resource management games that tend to just snowball during late-game.

Overall 7.5/10. I think the game still has room to grow but I'm keeping my expectations for early access low.

Just an idea for devs if you see this. It's a long shot but make an End Game that has the villagers seek out a "paradise" in a treasure hunt-style system. Like the movie Wall-E or Waterworld where the characters must find habitable land in a post-apocalyptic world. But this would require a big overhaul to the map instead of being just North-South. The Onbu could also backtrack it's path so the player might have to run around in circles. The map should be big enough that the player doesn't accidentally just stumble upon the paradise. There should also be clues around the map that scavengers could seek out and a cartography system to document the path the player has taken. Like a said, a long shot but I think this would be my dream version of this game. Also veteran is too easy. Cheers!

I bought this game because I like the restaurant management genre. Sadly this game feels incomplete even though a full launch is out. Hard mode is unplayable. A lot of mechanics need balancing. An example is customers being so angry just because something they like isn't on the menu. You literally need to have every ingredient on the menu. Causing the restaurant to have no sense of "specialty".

I think it can be better with some updates.

Overall 5/10

Reviewing this purely from playing in franchise mode. 100 hours in and still just have 6 habitats. This game is did not let down in being a spiritual successor to Zoo Tycoon.

First of all I love how Frontier chose to focus on the mechanics of the animals more so than the guest or anything else with the game. The coolest part I find about this game are the traverseability of animals. Now when I''m designing enclosures, the details 'actually' matters. It's not just for decoration 90% of the time.

For example, I was designing an enclosure for Red Pandas. I thought I securely made the barriers but I slightly misplaced a tree and some rocks that was 'climbable' by the Red Pandas and they escaped through it. It sucked but I was amazed by how well made this mechanic is. Zoo Tycoon 1 and 2 players will have more context to why this is so cool.

The other mechanics of the game also held their part. I won't explain all the mechanics but here's a small list of really cool things I just want to appreciate the game for.
- Animal Traverseability (like I said above)
- Breeding system, genetics (size, health, fur color), and yes inbreeding
- Each animal is really well made. From its art to the mechanics of how they go about
- Conservation Credits and Animal trading system in franchise mode (works well with inbreeding mechanic)
- Walk in habitats

The only negative I have about this game is accessibilty and optimization. The building systems needs some fixes because it can be very tedious trying to align things. Also lag spikes can occur when really zoomed in in a highly packed area with guest or a detailed built place.

Still, this game is worth every penny. I think the DLCs should be cheaper but I can always wait for a sale. (praying for Ocean/Bird DLC)

Overall 9.5/10

Honestly I can't recommend this game (yet). I wish there was a neutral review for Steam but I won't be a hater. I did thoroughly enjoy the first half of my playthrough with my friends. Although right now I'm in a "let's just finish it" mindset with the game.

My review is purely based on multiplayer PVE with around 2/3-3/4 completion based on the bosses I've beat.

V Rising is a well-made survival adventure game with pretty good bosses with a dash of MOBA-like battle elements such as skills and camera perspective. Where I think this game gets an edge is the sheer quantity of bosses and types of enemies you can face. Battle mechanics are also pretty good in its state. But in the other aspects of the game such as crafting, building, and exploring the game gets stale quickly.

I think there are two problems this game has and that is 1) Pace and 2) Replayability.

1) This game progresses too fast for a survival adventure game. At times, it feels like there are no moments where you can take a breather and just admire the world or things you've made in this game. A lot of items become obsolete too quickly after beating certain bosses. The materials in this game aren't versatile enough and what I mean by that is too many items are used very specifically and only used once or twice throughout the playthrough. My party never bothered to plant seeds until the later half of the playthrough until we really needed a specific resource.

2) V Rising's map isn't randomly generated so I would assume exploring the same map wouldn't be fun the second time. And unlike games where it focuses on a spontaneously generated story, V Rising doesn't focus on the story aspect. You can expect what you're going to get into other than the roaming bosses that wander around the map. The only positive I see is with PVP players and players who want to try different builds with skills.

With the negatives out of the way, I think V Rising's battle mechanics are great and have potential. Although some of the skills are too similar to each other. I would like to see skills that are more complementary and players should be more dependent on other players. Players should have more specific roles in a playthrough. Imagine taking some skills from Dota 2 to V Rising. Support role type spells are too weak currently. Players are too versatile skill-wise no matter what skills they're using as long as they have good gear. I suggest having three skill slots instead of two so solo players can have a chance to beat bosses alone. Also maybe have element effects added to the game like Magicka games, but that would probably take awhile to implement.

Overall 6/10