Recent reviews by Mad Monkey

For years I heard great things of the PlayStation "exclusive" God of War. Since it was exclusive, I never looked into it, until it came to PC. Started playing this game a few weeks ago and finished my first playthrough yesterday.

- The visuals are stunning
- Combat is great but can be quite a challenge, especially when you don't have the highest level gear yet
- The map is large though slightly restrictive. You can't jump except at predefined locations for instance, which creates some very artificial limitations. Example: Thanos can scale a vertical cliffside where he has the necessary handles and ledges, but he can't climb over a low, rough boulder that needs to be destroyed by an explosion.
- Story is AMAZING. I love old viking mythology, and quite a bit into the game there is some talk of the Greek mythology as well though that is very limited. It makes me want to play the older games to find out if Thanos' history is explained there, either in the gameplay story itself or in character dialogue form.
- I love that you can complete the game 100% with all Steam achievements in 1 playthrough on any difficulty. As somewhat of a completionist but not looking to get frustrated by difficulty, I despise having to grind through the same game on highest difficulty and still need to do more than one playthrough to get every achievement.

I normally don't buy new games when they're above 30€ because I still have hundreds of unplayed games, but I did buy the new Ragnarok sequel because I liked this game so much. Definitely recommend, looking forward to what the new game brings.

At the time of writing I have completed 1 full playthrough, started a 2nd solo playthrough and started a 3rd one with a friend. I have *never* immediately restarted a new campaign in the same game before, and I've been playing games since the mid 90s.

While it is not 100% perfect, it is hands down the best game I have played in a long time. Most of the downsides for me are things like the unsatisfactory companion quest ending for Karlach, the level cap at 12, or small oversights such as not being able to sort items while in a shop menu. Many of my grievances can be fixed with mods, though not all (at least not yet). And who knows, maybe some of these will be patched by Larian Studios, I would not be surprised if they would at the rate they've been releasing updates so far!

I can see how a number of people can perceive this game in many different ways depending on their knowledge of Dungeons & Dragons, and not everyone will like turn-based combat (or other aspects of the game for that matter), but I've thoroughly enjoyed the game and all of my friends who played it are very enthusiastic as well. Solid recommendation, 9.5/10!

I read all the reviews, thought they were probably exaggerated, and was proven wrong. I have literally played one single race and that is enough to never touch this game again.

A short summary:
- Character models look worse than N64 games. I've seen this same comment in another review and it is -not- exaggerated.
- The car selection/tuning options before a race are ridiculously uninformative.
- I've seen children with better understandings of physics than the devs of this game. I'm not saying it should be hyper realistic (especially not when playing a destruction / combat racer), but accelerating from 0 to 200 in less than 3 seconds and then (when everything is already flying around you) suddenly you need several more seconds to reach a speed around 240.
- The cars are so ridiculously fast and you constantly send objects flying around you that you have no idea of where your oponents are.

For me it's too late. I've wasted a whole 7 minutes on this game that I will never get back (and again as much on writing this review). If you want to torture yourself, please seek help (or at the very least seek better options than this game).

I got this game through Humble Bundle about 3 years ago, in 2018. At first I was not quite enthusiastic about the concept... Why would anyone play a game where you drive a truck as the main objective? Especially at that time I wanted to get as far away from traffic as possible.

After a few months I came to the realization that I had hundreds of games in my library but had not played more than 80% of them, so I started playing them all in alphabetical order (just to have some kind of structure in how I would pick which game to play next). I would play the games for at least long enough to get a decent feel about them. The ones I liked I would play to the end, others I would just abandon as soon as I realized I would not enjoy them.

When I got to American Truck Simulator, I thought this would be half an hour or boring traffic jams before I could go to the next one in the list. Boy, was I wrong... And I'm very glad about that! While the essence of the game is indeed "just driving a truck", there's also plenty of challenges.

You have to start your own trucking company from the ground up. Similar to some racing games, you drive for others first and you only take whatever amount of money they want to pay you for it, but once you can buy your own truck, that's where the real thing starts. Not only do you have to purchase it, you also have to maintain it (including repairs if you're a sloppy or even outright dangerous driver).

Then there is also the expansion of your company: expand your garage, hire new drivers, buy trucks for those new drivers, buy trailers, earn experience to be able to drive dangerous goods around and more. You can get a loan from the bank to help speed up the initial process, but keep in mind that you need to pay the loans back with interest, so you still have to work for that money!

And even if you are not there for the career, you can still enjoy the beautiful scenery. Especially now that there are viewpoints in the newer areas which showcase some of the points of interest, this game has turned into a real sightseeing gem.

Of course it's not all perfect though. The AI drivers around you are complete idiots, a great example that realism isn't always desirable. They will sometimes break (hard) without warning, which usually causes you to smash into their trunk and getting a "crash vehicle offence" fine on top of the damages to your truck. Even if an AI driver decides to randomly drive into you, the game may still sometimes give you that fine even though you were not to blame.

Another daunting element if you're new to the game is how many DLCs there are, and how much they cost. Don't get me wrong - I have all of them and don't regret buying a single one, but it's a bit overwhelming if you start out fresh. Especially because there is no discounted bundle option. Beautiful as they are, it is still a lot of money.

And then, there is the biggest element in the game which causes me grief. I've cursed at this, cried, yelled and threatened to throw my controller through my monitor. I hate every second that this takes up. And yet I keep doing it every time. I am a completionist at heart, and I will try to get full completion wherever possible for the games I like. For ATS, this means getting all achievements, but also getting 100% map discovery.

After every new expansion release, this is the thing that drives me absolutely bonkers. Let me paint you a picture. When you have drive your truck across the highway, you discover parts of that highway as you drive across them. Logical, right? Here's the thing. When the roads for the individual driving directions of the highway split up for whatever reason, the game will only discover the part that you're driving on. Doesn't matter if you're 3000ft away from that other road because you're split by a mountain peak, or 50ft on separate bridge elements. Doesn't matter if you can see it or not. If it's split, you need to drive each road segment individually to discover it. But wait, there is more.

Let's say you come to a complex highway crossing. You know, where you can take 2 separate exits from each direction to go to each possible other direction, and possibly some extras because the designer thought it looked good. Again you'll need to discover each road segment individually. But the worst, oh the absolute worst, is when you drive a normal road, and there is a junction for AI which is blocked off for players. There will be semi-invisible walls to prevent you from turning and following that other road, but there will be this teeny tiny mini stubble of that side road on the map where the junction is, and guess what. Yeah, you have to drive all the way up to that invisible wall to get that thing discovered. And there are enough of them in the game to prevent you from getting 100% if you ignore them. Fun, right?

To top it all off (and I'll end my rant after this, I promise), whenever the game developers change parts of an existing area, they sometimes also change the roads in that area. An example is how they recently reskinned parts of California. As a result of this, there will be road segments that become undiscovered again, because you haven't been there yet since they were changed. Fair enough, and I don't mind driving through a few new sections to see what's new. But then they also have these minimal changes that require you to zoom in on your map to the deepest level, and even then it only shows as a fraction of an inch undiscovered road... THAT is really frustrating for a completionist like me.

But enough ranting. The fact that I have 300+ hours in the game and still plan to purchase every DLC released for this game should say enough. Especially if you don't care about the map discovery part, I can absolutely recommend this game. As weird as it sounds, sometimes it's just relaxing to come home from work, jump into your truck and just drive in a semi-braindead state for a while before you do something else. And once you get your trucking company off the ground and have a few drivers working for you, you can even just drive around and discover the vast expanses of the USA without any trailers while your drivers generate enough revenue to maintain your own truck while you do whatever you want.

Of course this game is not gonna be fun for everyone, but I can say without a doubt that if you give this game an honest chance, you may find it to be way more enjoyable than you would have originally expected.

I love the Darksiders universe and story concept. Some elements may be a bit predictable and it's by no means a perfect game, but it's still one of the better ones out there IMO. There are difficulty settings for everyone's liking too.

Pros:
- Great storyline and game concept
- Much more character development than you'd see in some other modern games. Protagonist is badass.
- Lots of areas to explore. Personally I really enjoyed the fiery pits (The Hollows), felt a bit like a part of Hell).
- New types of enemies and frequent boss fights throughout the game ensure that it doesn't become boring
- Provides a tough gameplay experience for those who want a challenge, but there is an easy mode for those who don't.

Cons:
- The save system is pretty brutal. When you die, you'll be teleported back to the last Vulgrim location you visited (NPC vendor). The Lurchers (currency) that you've collected will be dropped where you die, or close to that location and you'll have to get them back. Any unlocked puzzles, opened doors etc. will not reset though so that's something at least.
- Even in the medium difficulty modes, the game is quite challenging because you can die quite easily and don't deal that much damage. Not as hard as Dark Souls games but still challenging. Mastering the dodge-counter maneuvers really helps, especially once you put some points into Arcane damage.
- Initially I disliked the lack of a map. It would be complicated because the environment is quite 3D so buildings and dungeons on multiple levels would be a pain to map out and navigate, but anything would be better than nothing. However, once you get to know the map a bit and you learn to use the compass, it's not that much of an issue. A horse would have been welcome though for faster riding through some areas.
- The upgrading system for your weapons is a bit of a pain. You need to collect specific items, but you won't find enough to upgrade everything to the highest level unless you grind them out in pointless killing of respawning trash mobs.
- I wish that there was more motivation to use the different kinds of weapons. I finished most fights with just the main whip and the Fire Hollow active, but almost never used any of the others. If they were not needed to navigate and solve puzzles, I wouldn't have touched them at all.

All in all, still a great game - don't let people tell you it's a terrible game because if you give it an honest chance, I think you may like it. As I said, it's not perfect, and I have a few frustrated moments too, but it's still absolutely worth it IMO.

TL;DR version: great game, definitely recommended. Final score 41/50!

*WARNING: review contains minor spoilers!*

Note 1: I score the different aspects of the game in my review. How much these scores will affect the final score for the game in it's entirety is based on what I personally find important in the games I play, so please keep that in mind when looking at these scores.

Note 2: I don't review multiplayer aspects and will judge most games by their main storyline as I find extra content less important.


Before going into any detail, I also want to say that I didn't read the Batman comics (yet), haven't seen the tv series at all and only saw 2 or 3 movies, so my knowledge about the Batman universe was quite limited when starting this game. I had some basic knowledge about a few characters, but most villains were unknown to me. That being said, I loved how the game provides the player with a bit of background info about every important character in the game.



The first few minutes were a bit confusing for me, as you just have to walk along with the Joker being escorted to his cell in intensive treatment. It felt as if I was missing something that I was supposed to do. When the game really starts, it also made more sense as you actually start receiving hints on how to perform certain moves in the game and how to handle certain situations.

As the story progresses, you encounter several dangerous enemies who have been released by the Joker and his henchmen, which I liked because it creates some variety in the game. Some of these super villains require quite a lot of attention (like Scarecrow and Killer Croc who have entire chunks of the main story dedicated to them), while others only play a minor role and could almost (if not entirely) be replaced with generic thugs (like Zsasz).

Batman needs to make sure that the Asylum staff that aren't murdered yet by the marauding thugs are rescued, while containing the threat posed by the villains who now rule the island. The storyline is well-written and even though it can be summarized in a few lines, it didn't feel as if the game was too short - although the final mission had me wanting more.

The only things that didn't really appeal to me were Scarecrow's special side missions (the effects of his fear gas were a lot better in the later games IMO), and the Riddler's collectibles (I just hate the guy, even though his role in Asylum was the smallest and easiest to complete of all Arkham games).

My score for storyline: 21/25



The combat system may take some getting used to for those who aren't familiar with the Arkham series. While you could technically just keep clicking your left mouse button to punch the baddies in the face in the early stages, later on you will still need to use certain skills to defeat special enemies because you can't attack them head-on.

Besides those few special enemies, it will be much easier to use the right skills at the right time. Even when only using normal attacks, timing can help you a great deal, but making large combos with lots of variation is what will get you the most out of it - especially when doing the challenges in the main menu. It's also fun that several gadgets like the batclaw and explosive gel can be used to make combat easier, instead of limiting combat to only punches, blocks, evades and stuns.

Downsides of the combat system are that it can sometimes be a bit buggy (like you would hit the right-mouse button to block an incoming attack, but it doesn't block), or the variation in how long animations play after clicking a single punch (losing your combo by waiting too long when you expect more punches to come after a single click).

My score for the combat system: 4/5



I was amazed at how the graphics looked. You obviously see a difference with advanced graphics in a game that would be released now, but given that Asylum was released in 2009, I think Rocksteady Studios did a stellar job here. Animations are still a bit chunky sometimes but nothing that really bothered me.

The map of the island may appear small, but the interior locations are quite extensive and some locations will change a bit when the storyline progresses so it doesn't feel too restricted or small. I also liked how they really used the different buildings or areas for different purposes in the game, like the medical facility labs to discover a formula, the botanical gardens to set up a lab to execute the formula etc.

As for general gameplay, there is one particular thing that bothered me in this game. Batman can use detective vision to look for clues or spot enemies behind cover and such. This is a very useful tool, but there are barely any downsides to using detective vision all the time so I really had to force myself to disable it from time to time to enjoy the graphics of the game instead of staying in detective vision the entire game except combat scenes.

As mentioned above, I am also not the biggest fan of the Riddler character (in any of the games), part because I don't like looking for hidden trophies throughout the entire game and part because he's just such an arrogant, annoying little ****. But on the other hand you do need to find his trophies for the extra XP so you can unlock more abilities, and his trophies and riddles also unlocked lots of background information that I needed to understand the villains better. I wouldn't have minded getting more XP from combat and unlock background info through dialogue with NPCs.

One final thing that bothered me was that in order to unlock all Steam achievements for this game (I am a bit of a completionist after all), you need to beat the game on hard mode. I started on medium difficulty (which was a good thing, since playing on hard difficulty would hide the visual cues when you should block an attack - not recommended for a first timer), but that meant I had to play throug the game again entirely to get this one stupid achievement.

My score for graphics: 5/5
My score for landscape: 5/5
My score for general gameplay: 4/5



Besides the main story, you can also access challenge mode through the main menu. There are 2 types of challenges: the first type is a combat challenge where you have to plow through 4 waves of thugs and survive until the last one is down, the second is a predator challenge which is basically taking down enemies in a stealthy way (partially because most of them will be armed with guns, which make it impossible to fight them head on like in combat challenges). Challenges are unlocked by finding specific riddler trophies in the main game or by completing parts of the main story.

You can earn 0-3 medals in each challenge: in the combat challenges medals are earned by reaching target scores, earning bonus points for finishing waves without breaking combo / taking damage or for using more variation in skills and gadgets. Predator medals require you to take down enemies in a specific way, like knocking out an enemy by using explosive gel to blast a wall nearby.

While I enjoyed some of these challenges, I don't think they were a real necessary part of the game. The combat ones can be a bit frustrating, especially when fighting one enemy close to a wall which makes your camera act like a fool, resulting in you being unable to see another enemy attacking you. That in turn will lead to breaking your combo by taking damage, and not getting enough points to reach the target score. Once you become familiar with them they should not be *too* hard to beat though.

My score for Challenges: 3/5



There may be a few minor frustrations in this game (for me at least), but overall I would definitely recommend this game, also for people who don't know much about the Batman universe.

Final score: 41/50 (82%)

Awesome game, great storyline, amazing graphics & features.

Downsides: Some animations look a lot like animations from other games (mainly Assassin's Creed), and the gameplay can be a bit repetitive at some point (find intel on captains, kill/dominate captain, find intel on war-chief, kill warchief, repeat).

In general: absolutely recommended, I look forward to the DLCs!

First of all: the game has some great graphics and some real potential if you're looking for a good hunting game.

Other than that:
- Quite boring. Your movement speed is quite limited (agreed, you should avoid making noise and all, but covering large distances at a slow pace is just plain boring), and it may take you a very long time to find your first prey. Some trails seem to be endless, I've even encountered some animals while tracking down another.
- VERY limited if you do not pay for licenses. You can only hunt one type of deer and one type of rabbit, but you can still find and track trails of other animals, which is quite confusing. Maybe this wouldn't be such a big thing if the game wasn't advertised as free, especially since a license isn't very cheap.
- The prey that you can hunt in the free game only comes in certain areas, so I've spent about 1.5 hour looking for deer trails in an area that didn't house any of them. Quite disappointing when you find out.

Overall, I've played it about 2.5 hours now and I would only recommend it if you have too much time, looking for a digital hunt and don't mind paying for it either. If that's not the case, go look for other games because this is a full waste of time.