Recent reviews by mik

I wrote a large review on how i felt about this on PS5, here is a summary of so
https://backloggd.com/u/mikvsl/review/1427701/

I want to start off by saying, i like everything that this story has done. For alot of people right now going through the story, whether its someone watching or someone playing there is mixed reactions to what the ending sequence has come to. Going into rebirth, like many others we was ready to find out whether or not the death of Aerith will still happen. From start to finish the agenda of that happening is being pushed CONSISTENTLY especially when you get to the final set of chapters of the game it becomes more prominent. I was happily on the train of her still dying and im glad they stuck with it, the team behind the game know that they can't toy with the story to much to the point where people hate it for what it is. Everything leading up to that moment i believe was handled well, the usage of the PS5 triggers was probably some of the best choice for a moment like that. But let me not reminisce on those moments, lets talk about everything that happens after that. After which of course Aerith passes away and the world starts to go a little crazy with the whispers and it gives us a sort of hope that Aerith is alive, im still very much in acceptance that she is dead and won't know until the third game, what i did love from everything that happened with Aerith's death is the amplification it gave to Cloud's craziness which directly links into Cloud even worse in the final parts of the story but this time Cloud is quite literally the same as he is in Advent Children where he is the only one to see/sense Aerith. I don't believe aerith has cheated death or survived, maybe in a different timeline but im happily believing she's dead whether its a different timeline or not the main timeline that the game is following is what we should all follow on the basis if its not alive in this, its not alive anywhere else. The end of part 3 may have the same ending of Advent Children in which Zack & Aerith walk into the light after everything. The ending is messy i will say that, but its messy in a way that if a few scenes were taken out of swapped it would allow for a better development going into the 3rd game.

I wish they committed fully to an Aerith death scene or not. Doing both just emotionally jacked with me because now we have Cloud who thinks she’s alive with a team who thinks she’s dead, and he’s just oblivious. It also hurts so much that in chapter 13 and 14 he was pretty much a total ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥—especially to Tifa which really hurt after seeing their intimate scene on their date—and he never really fully owned it or made amends. Speaks volumes to the teams ability to love and forgive and accept him. And I understand why he was being that way. Sephiroth was hard ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ with his mind and using him, so it wasn’t fully Cloud. My first problem was going in hoping for a happy-ish ending but knew that wasn’t going to happen. What I got instead just hurts.

The same thing that happened with the Remake ending is happening with Rebirth, for those who genuinely love the story and want to know what happens will spend their next 3-4 years being psychopaths and building theories of nothing until we get actual information, others will have the same reaction to what they did with remake in which they hate it and say that it doesn't make sense and compare it to Kingdom Hearts. For people to always resort to Nomura being the butt of the joke whenever it comes to time travel has always been my least favourite thing to see, the approach of Rebirth with the culmination of CBU1 shouldn't be put all on Nomura's head because of him being Creative Director and i believe the way this story has been reimagined has been done in a way I've been happy experiencing and most likely many others.

I disagree that this game was written poorly. If you don’t like multiverse stuff, I can see it being considered poorly written. I don’t mind it, and the way they did it I thought was very good. The character development was phenomenal. Writing wise I do think Aerith’s end was just a lack of full commitment, and playing too much the “make everyone happy” thing. In one sense, it’s a great ending meaning it guts you and leaves you confused and frustrated and hopeful all at once. I did not come away from that ending unamused or outright angry only. In another sense, the ending just makes me hate Cloud for being a ♥♥♥♥ and insensitive. Again I understand why, I don’t need commenters ripping my post to shreds, just emotionally processing this game lol.

They delivered on the game, they delivered on the story and setup thoughts and speculations for the 3rd game as they did with the 1st, it is expected to be confused. All of us were confused when it came to the ending of remake and where the story will go and that exact moment is being relived through the ending of rebirth. Genuinely excited for what Part 3 holds, if done correctly and amplified for what this game has done in many ways it may end up as my favourite of the trilogy and one of the best reimagines of a story to be retold in a new era.

What I've noticed and find fascinating is the anger people show, but I don't think they understand why they are angry, the emotion they are feeling from the game is the frustration with how all that build up and they still failed. How the story is playing just like a 3 Act Play, this being their low point. It sucks for a story to end like that but you need the darkest moments in order for those brighter moments to shine and have more meaning.

The Finale has the potential to leave a big impact because the direness of the situation is in such a state that when the heroes are able to overcome it, and it's deserved, it will feel that much more rewarding to have been apart of that journey. Let us all rejoice for 4 years with theories until we get news on Part 3


No Promises Await At Journey's End.

Took me some time to think up what i wanted to say about this game but all in all this was a very fun experience and makes me very excited for what other studios in china produce.. Im looking at YOU Phantom blade zero.

With its ARPG approach with certain souls elements it was a fun ride to go through, I was going into this game expecting it to just be like any standard souls-like but it doesn't quite hit that nail on the head to fit into it other than the generic archetypes that you find in that genre.

From start to beginning the quality of each boss fight was widely engaging and had me wondering what each one would end up being like the further i got into the game, especially with the variety that comes from all bosses than it being simply a large human with a sword.

I do wish there was more engagement from the cast throughout the game, shoutout to Zhu Bajie my absolute GOAT of the entire story and his arc that you have with the spider ladies. For once in that entire story the Spider arc & connection for Zhu baije was genuinely the best part of the game story wise.. i would be telling a lie if i said it didn't get me emotional.

Overall this game does a great job at making a fun ARPG with an interesting fighting loop until you've essentially mastered it.. to slowly get bored of it towards the very end. The animations between each chapter and the secret ending wrapped up this game perfectly for me.

Once again, i love you zhu bajie.

A 13 year long wait for a game that delivered correctly on what it needed to do but not on what people may have expected.

SM2 at its best is another great addition to the highly loved horde shooter genre with a WH40K coat of paint on it, with my high love for WH40K it was a great journey to go through this game and be genuinely in awe over environment work and how being a space marine should truly feel.

For some this may not reach the expectations that they had been hoping for after such a long wait, for me i was satisfied with story and length. The COOP experience allowed for a lot more of a immersive time.

This is a genre of game that can always live on and with time if supported with their already shown roadmap, this will easily live up to being one of the best WH40K games next to the Dawn of War series.

Of course with a game like this it is expected that people will get tired of doing the same thing over and over with the minimal amount of content based inside PvE and PVP on launch, for what it is im already 30-40 hours in and still finding fun in spending time making myself look amazing with customization and PVP every now and then.

SM2 delivers on showing what is possible with the WH40K universe in a AAA state and i can only hope that we see more games in this universe and show to GW that their IP is highly loved.

Once again this was truly a great experience from an amazing studio, but its not in my mind at a 5* level that a lot of people have stated it to be at, the expansion was overall extremely fun and objectively had far too much fun getting my ass beat on select few bosses just because of the experience each boss had.

I had more of a problem with a lot of the bosses in this expansion and how much it would completely break my camera to the point it wouldn't make sense to ever lock onto a single boss, dodge timings are extremely tight it almost felt ridiculous, this expansion was genuinely a difficulty spike that not a lot of us were expecting but was a warm welcome after getting past a few bosses.

Whether its difficulty, story, items, diversity in bosses and monsters. This expansion does not equal to a 5, at most this expansion is a 4. The bosses and the cinematic elements that amplified second phases and scenery elements around every zone pushed this expansion. Each area was wonderful to walk into and genuinely be taken back by how well the scenery is. Last boss including ending is unambitious and overshadowed by a certain badass dragon fight.

Performances issues did not affect me so i have no reason to comment on that, sucks that others got it but i had a smooth experience going through the entire game.

Overall this expansion was more than worth the price tag it came with, and everything put into this felt like a full game. Tedious moments but an overwhelming satisfying experience after every boss kill, classic fromsoftware.

Genuinely a really refreshing amount of fun when it comes to playing a game that revolves around mechanics used in other MMOs and predominantly in FF14. Knowing how to resolve mechanics that you've encountered in fights you haven't been in or just done in FF14 in a different setting is great fun.

If you've always found an interest in raiding in an MMO and wanting to know what you will possibly encounter, this game will happily give you the stress and anxiety of learning how to solve mechanics that may even persuade you into playing FF14 for the raiding until you realise how bad some people are at it.

Another great time to start off the amazing 2 months of 2024, its always great when a new horde shooter gets released and its a perfect experience to play with friends. One thing this does say is this that playstation should push to have their games released more day 1 on both PS & PC.

Of course a PC release is going to have its problems when the game has been built to play on PS5, ive seen not stop reviews of people having performance issues or crashes. I had a point where i was crashing for about 5minutes but the problem fixed itself, and my pc is less powerful than people reviewing with 30series/40series (im owning 1660ti / 2700X) and my game is running smooth and perfectly fine at a good 60-70fps.

Allegedly kernel level anti cheat (same tier as Vanguard level anti cheat) is something to consider, though it doesn't seem to have any impact on the game. you probably don't need to care about it.

Can't be that bad of a bad purchase at £35 when other studios are dropping a game at £70 at less quality than what this game released at. Its been given a update on what is to expected from the game, roadmap, free updates, new mobs, weapons etc. I think the game will be a major hit or major miss for most people, largely depending on if your hardware agrees with the game or not. The gameplay itself is extremely fun and challenging depending on your difficulty, with quite a lot of replayability with friends.

I expect alot of the problems people are encountering right now will be fixed as soon as possible (at the time of this post there's already been a hotfix)

If you love horde shooters and wanted something ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ crazy to play, this would be the game to play. With amazing sound design, a variety of missions and weapons, hilarious moments to share with friends & already confirmed updates to add towards the game with developers watching how everyone's reception is, there's only a good track record to where the game could end up.

rust for babies with forced pokemon labour camp simulator

genuinely a good amount of fun with a confirmed roadmap that intends to add more content over the coming months this year

I've been patiently waiting for a game that is aRPG with the addition of being allowed to play with friends, after playing multiple aRPG games throughout the last 3-4 years, its been evident that the experience could be elevated by involving an aspect of multiplayer/co-op.

This game has proved that exact statement, its one of those games that was stuck in development hell for almost 7 years but comes out prevailed keeping the same fundamental ideas and grounded approach to what makes RPG games great. With the addition of co-op i find myself playing this game for endless hours and the additional announcements of new characters and content to be added in the coming months.

This would be one of those games that you would believe would surface from being live-service but that mode never usually works out for most games and im glad that this game isn't a live service, produce content every 4-5 months or have the same model as MH with big expansions giving you the incentive to come back to the game... I would find myself being more inclined to the later

Overall the game is great, it had its problems with the multiplayer region lock but it seems that the developers are doing their very best to improve the pc experience. I did bump into a few crashes in cutscenes that would have me restarting chapters because it was during a cutscene but it never deterred me from pushing through it so that i can continue enjoying the game.

Really neat gameplay concept that makes me realise gitaroo man should of received a sequel. The game does suffer from some boring writing, however i did enjoy the characters that you meet and join your group later on into the game.

As for the game itself, i enjoyed it. Im a big fan for action games and it was nice to see something involve a new style and put rhythm into the mix, as mentioned before one of my very beloved games gitaroo man which was a rhythm game back on the PS2 followed very similar ideas that this game shares, its almost as if the game was taken as inspiration at parts.

The whole style of this game, the vibrant and expressive characters, and the great level design make this a game a nod towards previous rhythm games that have come in the past that should be revisited. For an action game it doesn't equal to capcom or bayonetta level of combat but its enjoyable with the addition of trying to stay in sync with the music to reach higher score points and fun with staying in flow with the beat playing.

My least favourite part of the game being the platforming and that seemingly feeling a bit janky and weird at times where i would find myself overjudging or propelling myself in the complete wrong direction when trying to climb up to the next area.

So after all the hype this received earlier this year, It really commits to its core concept which is why I do like the game, and at the end of it all I was left wanting more. I'm not sure if I wanted the same thing but with faster, more intense music, or the same thing but with a more compelling narrative.

If the developers of gitaroo man ever find me, please take into consideration that more rhythm games should be made.

Something about this game shows how much fun can come from a game that is just built with very small fundamentals, I love everything about this game and heavily reminds me of SCP. I don't think ive found so much funny moments and genuine scares. For the price that this game is everyone should buy it and play with your friends. This is a level of survival horror every game should aspire for because nothing is better than watching your friend on proximity mic run down a hallway screaming while a giant spider is on his ass.