Shadows of Change is a disappointment from top to bottom. Whether it is the price increase to that of a fully fleshed out race pack for only a few new units and a few legendary lords, the numerous bugs both unfixed and newly introduced, or the tone-deaf statement from CA that says 'buy it, or we will pull support', it is hard to find many things redeeming about this DLC.

You can tell the changeling was the lord that received the most care and attention. As detailed later, many of Cathay's reworked mechanics are either lackluster or do not work as intended. As a lord, Yuan Bo also has several issues denoted in the bugs section.

Kislev is missing Ungol units and replaced them with units that, in lore, have no connection to Kislev. Furthermore, we have no lore of hags as a magic type or hag lord, so your armies are being led by Boyars instead of the proper lord. Truly a missed opportunity, in my opinion. The Kislev rework is also very disappointing and does not deal with many of the underlying endemic issues that Kislev deals with as a faction. Why does the new lord start in Dark Elf territory? This is not explained either and is not loreful.

Several of the units in this 'premium' DLC also feel like pay-to-win. One of the big surprises from the DLC launch announcement is that CA has multiple playtesters. If CA does have an actual QA team, how come the bugs listed below is so extensive?

New maps don't work:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROM8NihNomQ&t=609s&ab_channel=LegendofTotalWar

Yuan Bo can't hit single entities and sometimes gets stuck in dragon form:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QxbKeAStow

The cockatrice had the attack move bug (CA has said this has been fixed many times with other units):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KdHzad5ij4&ab_channel=HumanBoyYesYes

The new battle AI has been lobotomized:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iE0BknWbeQ&t=1195s&ab_channel=OnePitchMan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIJe4If50F0

Rice paddy maps still lowering FPS despite being 'fixed'

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

Kairos still has the old changing of the ways on his skill line, Beastmen red line skills do not enhance their new units. The new war drum unit also has issues with its animations. I could go on.

These are just the bugs we know about right now. Who knows what else we will find?

All in all, this DLC is a disappointment. I have bought every DLC and game up to this point, CA, and I will not be purchasing any more DLCs, games or other products from you further.

What TWW3 needs is a custodian team to give regular, meaningful fixes to the game in between DLCs and proper funding to the development team so that the content matches the price. My opinion of the game is that it is stagnating and not getting better.

Even one of TWW3 greatest supporters is tired of your BS:

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

CA, please listen to your community and do better; you are rapidly losing all the goodwill this community has given you all these years. I am predicting Pharaoh and especially Hyenas will not do well; please focus your attention on your one profitable product.

To start this review, I am level 107, and truly enjoy this game. This is my first live service online game, and I have played with people from all over the world.

With Sony's announcement that a PSN network is required, some of my friends can only play the game with a VPN. This includes friends I added from the Baltics and the Philippines, to name a few.

Per Sony's terms of Service here:

https://www.playstation.com/en-us/legal/psn-terms-of-service/

3.1. All information provided during Account creation, and during the use of your Account, must be accurate and complete. We reserve the right to suspend, terminate or restrict any Account (including as stated in Section 12.2 of this Agreement) that uses or was created using false information, or that we determine was created or used for a purpose that violates this Agreement.
3.2. During Account creation you must select the country or region of your residence and in which your account will be registered in. Once your account is created, you will not be able to change the country or region code associated with your account.
12.2. Suspension or Termination by SIE. With or without notice, we may restrict, suspend or terminate your PSN Account and PlayStation Device, or indefinitely restrict, suspend or discontinue your access to or, or use of, certain PSN Content, offerings, features, products and services, if you violate this Agreement or we have a reasonable belief such a violation has or will occur, or as otherwise may be reasonably necessary to protect our PSN users, our partners, our platform, or other SIE interests.

Sony can terminate your account and any games anytime it wants for using a VPN. The Playstation Network is not present in all countries worldwide and requiring it post-launch is a scummy move.

Here is one player from China being banned while on VPN.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjic6m/someone_has_already_gotten_banned_for_trying_to/

The developers have made some interesting comments about this nonsense:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjcyuo/the_real_reason_behind_this_recent_controversy/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjbguv/arrowhead_community_manager/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjb63e/community_managers_position_about_the_new/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjeygm/so_according_to_the_moderator_we_were_the_ones/

This is a very poor attitude to have. This is on top of the previous inappropriate comments a community manager made previously.

https://twitter.com/Grummz/status/1776398416819724799

They have also forced people to verify accounts with mobile numbers, which means they can limit people from making their concerns known.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjnh03/helldivers_discord_has_just_enabled_mobile/

Sony, for their part, has changed their wording about PC games requiring PSN.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjk9r4/playstation_just_updated_their_official_site_on/

Finally, in some countries, it is not just a throwaway email like certain discord moderators nonchalantly say.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cjc5kw/just_use_a_throwaway_email/

Overall, it was a very disappointing move, and I hope Arrowhead pushes back against Sony. I theorize Sony has done this to improve their subscriber numbers for the next earnings call. There is no logical reason why a Steam ID is not enough to play a game.

Whether or not Steam will refund people after they have played more than two hours due to this change remains to be seen.

Mechwarrior 5 Clans is excellent in some ways but terrible in others. It is an improvement in some ways to Mechwarrior 5, but it falls short in many other places Mechwarrior 5 did well. For context, I have 100%ed the game before writing the review and completed the game before Hotfix #3. There may be changes to the bugs I mentioned in my review.

Mechwarrior 5 Clans has an exciting story that currently has two branches. It harkens back to some of the previous story-based Mechwarrior games I grew up with, which was a nice change of pace compared to what Mechwarrior 5 was. The cut scenes are well done, and attention is paid to the established lore and canon throughout. If you, like me, are worried about some of the needless changes within the Battletech/MechWarrior community as of late, rest assured none were found in the game. This is like a love letter written to fans of older titles, and it shows.

That being said, there are several key issues with the game. The first is the lack of optimization and how framerates are all over the place, especially in dense terrain. It is not playable on the Steam Deck either at >= 30 fps at the lowest settings, so if you want to play it on Deck, you cannot do so currently, even after the latest hotfixes. I often found myself on a mission, seeing my framerates vary wildly from mission to mission. This is similar to what Mechwarrior 5 was like when it launched, and I think the game needed more polishing before release. Two of my friends returned the game within the 2-hour window as even though their PCs were well above minimum spec, they could not run it at a reliable 30 fps. For myself, I can't get it to stay at 60 fps reliably mission to mission with my 3070. I have had no other issue playing any other AAA release game this year, so it is definitely a game issue. I hope this gets patched soon.

The game is very expensive as well. To 100% the game on expert difficulty and do both branches of the story took me only 23 hours. There is very little replay value currently. Although the dev team states that there will be DLC in the future, I can't grade the base game based on future promises. For my $100+ CAD, I expect more. Buy it on sale if you really want it.

My two previously mentioned friends had severe issues connecting and playing co-op. We had issues with crashes and disconnects even when I was hosting. I do not know if this has been rectified or not, but keep that in mind if you are buying it for co-op play.

Overall, I think as a long-term MechWarrior fan, it is a good game for the 20+ hours you get out of it. But with the issues with performance, co-op play and the high price of the game, I can only recommend people buy this game now if you are a hardcore fan. I give the game a 6/10 for technical issues, and I hope the development team can add more meaningful content and patch the optimization and co-op issues so that it can be played by more people.

It makes me sad that Mechwarrior 5 and Clans are so middling as games, and they need mods to truly shine. I cannot wait for mods for MechWarrior 5 Clans and hope the community can also help this game reach its true potential.