Recent reviews by Hipcola

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yThfdrdFL8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N78ZX9NfKwo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqQuihD0hoI

There's just not enough depth.

A game about natural selection, genes, selective breeding, enviromental conditions.
But also "Kawaii!!! I wanna make cutie foxies!!1! UwU <3 <3"

They all die horrible deaths. And the breeding works around that. Want a swimming fox? Throw your digging foxes in the water, they spend 50 turns in there and you unlock the swimming gene. Then you "Apply" it to a creature and you've got a 50% chance of the kids having it. There, done.

If you want to make cute creatures you're kinda limited too. They all end up looking like an eevee evolution. When I played it actually felt harder to breed green eyes than it did claws, so good luck if you're picky.

So nobody is happy. Cute animals die making people that can't afford dogs upset, and people that want to spend 400 hours breeding perfection then name it 'Unit X' are let down.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtU5V1b5tGc

It's sandboxy, die and try again, kill baddies to get better at killing baddies, collect the things, stealth but not really, horror but not really... INDIE GAME.
But not really. The studio that made this are backed by some big talent, people with real games to their names. But this feels like an indie game. Something that came to be in a bedroom.

There's no real focus, no tension, no pacing. You'll be completely numb to the enemies within minutes, which is a shame, because there's definetly something to them, their wreckless charges, their dead stare as they aim at you. There might have been a real sense of fear and dread at the sight of them if it wasn't so easy to pop them all in the head and take their dead coin like a soul reaving robin hood.

The visuals? Marmite. You're given lots of sliders so you can alter that harsh black and white to something more your taste. It's not core to the game; for something so striking it seems strange to allow players to turn the 'art style' off. I personally toned it down just a pinch and I really believe I improved on the default setting. You know, the one the artists chose. Bunch of wasters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJztRnDxdM8

First of all, the writing.

This is a game approaching heavy themes. It's WW2. A red army sweeping across definitely not Europe. Nationalistic, donning regal military uniforms, proclaiming the power of their race. The 'United western allies', trying to stop them. The Darcsens are pretty much the Jewish people, even shown enslaved in labour camps.
It approaches these heavy themes like a generic jrpg. To the point where you're not far off to imagine this game as Tidus and Yuna on an adventure to stop Hitler. That'd be a better game, summoning Ifrit in Kransberg Castle.

It doesn't handle the weight of these themes well at all. Characters will talk glumly about enslavement or the horrors of war, then rattle off trite lines about working together.
You can maybe accept it all if you think of it as trying to present a heavy topic to a young audience, while still being entertaining. But I don't even think it does that well...
If you're the type to play a lot of jrpg's. If you enjoy 'the tomboy', 'the leader', 'the gruff male'. Androgynous youth hamming it up. If that's your ♥♥♥♥, you'll enjoy this. But maybe you won't, because normally it's set in fantasy land, with magic and monsters. Here your plucky characters are facing machine gun fire. Although the way everybody acts you'd think they were at disney land.

There is a gay 'lancer' who's a treat though, pure quality.

Now the actual game. It's difficult playing this after the rebirth of xcom and with all the fantastic strategy going around right now. VC is a poorly designed strategy game. The main reward system focues on turns taken. Look up how to ace any map and it will involve buffing a character with 'orders' and having them make a sprint to the finish. There's nothing incentivising slow play. The maps are laid out in such away you'll likely progress simply leap frogging two characters across a laid out path, running right up to people and headshotting them as quickly as possible. Maybe you need a grenade now and again.
Moving up your entire squad, positioning them in cover, flanking and doing what you'd expect, feels awful in this game. You quickly stop doing it. It never makes any sense to play so slowly.
The game doesn't even use the interesting ideas it seems built around. Characters 'like' each other, and get boosts if they're near each other. Good luck noticing when this ever has an impact. Don't spend a long time in the barracks trying to match them up. It's a waste of time. Characters also have unique boosts depending on their surroundings or situation. One character might get a vision boost at night with the perk 'Nocturnal'. The problem with this mechanic is that these perks happen at random. They're dice rolls that might win you a game, but you can't repeat them. You can't build a strategy around them. Lots of the maps are gimmicks. You quickly realize, 'oh, this is what the designer wants, guess I'll do that then'. It's less a strategy game and more of a puzzler. And that goes against the very mechanics of the game. Missing a shot when you're trying to finish a round in 6 turns isn't fun. You don't care about stats or percentages when everything comes down to, 'will it take two moves or one to kill this guy'. The situations where character bonuses will make this difference are so rare and unlikely that you never think about them.
It's a mess.

It does look very lovely though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcQi_bluNzo

It's a puzzle game based entierly around a command line.
Every action in the game is completed by writing in a text box :
'DELETELOGS',
'HACK deepnet:alpha',
'SCAN ReallyLongServerName.YouBetterHopeYouDidNotMissSpellMe:com'

I guess if you've never used a command line before, this experience might make you feel like a hacker. Typing away, the dull clatter of the keyboard in your ears. The lurid green display, showing nodes and links that represent your progression through each puzzle. I guess you could get into it.

NAH!
If this appeals to you, I don't want to talk to you. Get away from me.