Recent reviews by Illutian

The 'pirate gameloop' isn't as robust as it was in Assassin's Creed: Black Flag. But it's still a fun enough game to pick up. Hopefully they'll add the 'free form' exploration we had in AC:BF; I miss diving off the ship and swimming around...despite the sharks.

I find the Character Progression to be quite well-done. And surprisingly grind-free with the use of "Free Experience" that is generated when you max out a Skill Branch and continue to use the item tied to that branch.

The combat is a bit janky, but this has more to do with the limits of our current era input devices; VR's motion detection would be superior here.

Graphics are a bit underwhelming, which is a shame. But it's likely a limit of Engine and lack of finances to hire a larger asset development team. Plus with the large-scale battles...well. No one likes slideshows.

Overall, I would recommend this game.

However, as of March 3, 2023, I would also still consider this 'Earl Access' in terms of stability and bug issues; That's not a slam on the Devs, just an observation from someone with more hours than sense in gaming.

While I still recommend this game. I would not recommend it for anyone looking to have a 'multiplayer experience'. This game's multiplayer was an after-thought. Even with all the 'network mods' out there, the game is fundamentally not designed to be played outside of LAN. If you play 'online', you can expect desyncs (unless you're the host).

--Previous Review--
Still loving the game. Though, I don't think the staying power of it will be in 'mob fights'. I find most of them to be rather boring. In fact, the more common ones (looking at you Greydwarves!) are just frustratingly annoying. Not because they're hard, but because their a nuisance.

The true staying power is in the building. You don't even need mods to find HOURS of enjoyment in building a base; destroying it, because you thought of something even more grand. Nine hours later, and you're just finishing the courtyard.

Toss in the amazing mods from the community, and we'll be seeing Valheim Legendary Edition (yes, a jab at Skyrim; another game I've enjoyed).

--Previous Review--
August 19 to 22; 32.9hrs...ya, I'd say I like it. :P

It's like Minecraft, but with more polygons and slightly more texture resolution (there's mod to give it even more!).

Just the building, alone, is fun. If you like just that, make sure to enable Dev Mode (assuming they leave it in).
...it [building] reawakened my feels of making a world in Neverwinter Nights (not the MMO).

I _would_ recommend playing on a server. Val is definitely something you get more out of by playing with others 'in the world'.

* Liking the Multiplayer
* Campaign is decent; dislike the time gab between the cinematic and the start of the game
* Weapon-play feels solid
* GRAPPLE. SHOT. hnnnnnnnnng

As of now. I can no longer recommend this game. The dev team is incompetent. And I'm not hyperbole-ing. They just broke Chat (everyone's character needs to be 72hrs old, so now no one can use Global). They broke crafting (it doesn't take from Storage; have to have the items in inventory. You also can't craft Legendaries anymore; broken). The Trading Post is broken (will say you don't have the items even when you do).

This is after practically everyone on the PTR was begging them to thoroughly test the patch out. AGS does not bother with QA. Opting to instead break more than their patches fix.

Additionally, they've reverted the 90% Property Tax reduction. Even with the change to the tax formula it now costs about THREE times as much gold as it did when the Reduction was in place.
....so now one must play nearly every day, in a broken game, just to eek out enough coin to pay for a house. IRL Simulator?

At this point. I'm truly worried that Lost Ark, while only being PUBLISHED by AGS, will also fail (in the West) due to their incompetence.

--Older Review; see how far they've fallen--
TL;DR: Diamond in the rough.

So far I'm having a lot of fun. Which might seem strange given the lack of 'systems' in the game to "retain player attention".

It's rather refreshing to have an MMO that hands you reigns and just says: I'll just make sure you don't crash into a tree.

The gameplay loop is rather enticing. I find myself working towards better gathering tools so I can gather faster because I've leveled the various gathering skills up to 'better resources', which take longer to gather with the same 'old' tools I have.

I find myself doing mostly just the Town Project "quests" because while they are repetitive they are quick. And unlike "Dailies" in games such as WoW. There's no 'currency' tied to them, that if you don't do them EVERY-SINGLE-DAY-THEN-YOU-ARE-OBJECTIVELY-FALLING-BEHIND-AND-WILL-BE-WEAKER-THAN-EVERYONE-DOING-THEM. So no pressure. I can do a project or not.

The music is 'on point' just as the 'zone theme'. I went into Brightwood and instantly got hit with WoW's Duskwood vibe. And oh man. It's like Duskwood graduated and went off to business school while hitting the Zumba classes; it's tone af and well-educated.
...it's amazing. Exactly as I would picture Duskwood if redone to be "realistic" in terms of graphics.

The Corruption events are pretty fun. Especially because the atmosphere literally changes when you get near one. And then all of a sudden these 'elite' mobs come out of the Fog of War (best way to describe how it functions). And now you're running for your life! :D

Going back to Town Projects. It's quite nice to do quests with the knowledge they are helping to build up the Settlement. Watching as each crafting station is upgraded.

I won't comment much on the issues like Queue times, because those will settle out in about a month.

The biggest issue I've had is the Corruption event's special music getting stuck on loop, playing over the zone's music. Apparently, as of this post, if you start a Corruption event and it finishes before you can do enough to 'get credit' then the game doesn't unload the ambient music played for Corruption areas.

((The fix is to find another event and either do enough to get credit or run in and back out to trigger the "Warning you are about to abandon the event" alert message.))

This issue should be fixed as it can be replicated pretty easily, so I'm sure other's have had this issue and reported it (as I have).

I also won't say the reviews of others are wrong. It's their opinion.

I will say this game is much more 'freeform' than games like ESO, WoW, or FF14. So if you just want to 'do your own thing' and not feel like you need to do XYZ or "you'll suck". Give this a try.

Always liked the Civ series. Civ6 is no different.

The biggest gripes I have are:

-Lack of multiple leaders per country (why not 5 US Presidents to pick from?)
-AI is kind of chicken even on Deity (nuked one and the other 4 suddenly wanted peace)
-AI is really stupid (gimme all your diplo points; NO!; 100 gold?; OKAY! - Meaning I always win any Diplo 'world quest' given during Apocalypse Mode)
-A BATTLESHIP DOES NOT BECOME A MISSILE CRUISER! (Seriously, it's not fun having this massive ship that upgrades into something akin to a child's bath toy)

The biggest pre-existing gripe would have to be being unable to expand the 'sphere of influence' of the city (the 'Tile Working'). What's the point of trying a One City Challenge or even just playing normally if you can't work the extra tiles you slowly take over (unless you play a crazy Civic build; then it's like PacMan nomnomnomnom). Like, you could balance it by saying tiles outside the 'normal' sphere contribute additional Disloyalty and Amenity Usage (formerly Happiness in Civ5).

So far, so good. There's the typical crashes to be expected for any game that's just been released or just gotten an expansion. I prefer to list faults rather than praises. I mean, do you really care if the visuals are stunning if the game crashes after 30min of play (as an example)? Probably not. You want the dirt, what's wrong with the product. So...

The biggest issue so far has been with a 'certain NPC' continuing to follow me. This was fixed by reloading a save and changing my decision. - The decision wasn't completely antithesis to my original playing; just I was the one who killed him. :P

Driving is a bit wonky..so vehicles clearly have no tire treads and drive on butter. While others seem to be clued to the road. - This is in regards to turns of the wheel.

I also dislike you can't set a speed. I assume a controller would fix this, much like it did for Halo CE. - The thumbstick acted like an accelerator pad; it wasn't stop or full-go like on keyboard.

Why are the cops just jackholes. I literally stand next to them and they want to shoot me. :(

I dislike that you can't 'save your vehicle' either. Find a sweet ride? Bang it up a bit? Oh well. - Look. The cops were dead, they clearly weren't in a position to protest me taking their ride.

I also don't like that you can't change your character after the Creator Screen. Do you even understand. I CAN CHANGE MY SKELETAL STRUCTURE ON A WHIM, but my face? My gender? Noooo, that's beyond our science.

I'm a bit annoyed that Romance was put 'on rails'. Some might really like the personality of a certain character, but can't romance them because 'wrong gender'. My play-through isn't your play-through. So it doesn't diminish Representation to allow the same character to either be hetero or gay.

Also a bit annoyed you can't max out all your skills and attributes. Like...why. This is the future. Why can't we be the 'most perfect' human?

But. Do I enjoy the game. Well..at the time of this posting, I have 40.1 hrs in the game...it's Dec. 14th, 2020..the game released Dec. 10th, 2020 in my region.
...I 'might' really like it.

Look. I don't have a problem. So what if I've only been playing for three weeks. I can stop anytime I want.

...I just choose not to; an empire doesn't run itself!

Seriously, though. This game is a lot of fun if you enjoy managing a society.

The only gripe I have with this game (and games like it), is the game forces you to play quick. By that I mean, you cannot afford to fall behind in [in the case of Stellaris] Tech, Fleet Power, Economic Power. If you do you run the risk of having one or more AI empires declaring war on you.

I greatly hate this method of "make the game challenging". Because it forces you to play the same way every time; build up fast.

((I'm the methodical gamer, I like to take my time building up my base and slowly expand outward.))

Other than that, Stellaris is a solid game.

It's good to be back again. There's really nothing to review about the game, itself. It's the same game(s) of Halo we played on the PC (and later console). So if you liked the game back then, you'll like it now.

I won't ding the graphics much, because with the older title (Halo CE) it's a substantial improvement over the original, but still 'horrible' by today's standards of what a 'remaster' should look like (literally). I don't believe the blame is 343, I think the blame is: "You'd have to remake the game from the very base (aka code)".

Halo CE: One thing I did notice is on a multi-channel audio (7.1 here) the reload sounds of the weapons come off "not right". It's like being surrounded by people reloading at the same time. It's not directional sound, which would have it coming out the right-side channel(s).

Hoooowever....

I dislike the lack of a playerbase. It seems everyone shifts to the 'lastest Halo' released for this Collection*. I worry about the longevity of this franchise on the PC Platform if the player count doesn't increase; 2/3 of the appeal is the Multiplayer. - Story's excellent, but you really only need to play through it once. After that it's just chasing achievements. But in the end, it'll be the Multiplayer that keeps you coming back.

*At the time of writing, MS had not released all of the titles.

Overall, I'd buy it..sale or no sale. It's such a good story (Bungie's, imo).

...Don't ever let her go.

o7

EA Review:
Shows promise. Modding Community is really carrying this, though. Hopefully the dev team will implement some of the tweaks (ie: Hiring Patrols to keep your lands safe from bandits).

It's still a "diamond in the rough", but still enjoyable. Even if it does have a lot of exploits, that can make you so rich you just buy the lands from lords; make Profit not War! :P