Recent reviews by zeus

best card game i've ever played

Logic in Skyrim:

>Find out Anise's secret
>Kill Anise
>Steal stuff from her cabin after she's dead
>Hired thugs come after me for stealing
>Anise sent them

10/10 would be taught a lesson by mercenaries sent from a dead woman again.

[May contain spoilers!] Mafia III is an open world crime game set in the year 1968. You play as Lincoln Clay, a Vietnam war veteran out for revenge for the killing and betrayal of his family. I don't write many reviews but I felt like I needed to let people know what's up with this game, without talking about graphics.


Seeing as this game is "open-world", I should open with that. I believe that a succesful open world game should have at least 100 hours worth of content excluding collectibles. This means that there should be an abundance of side missions, activities such as drinking, mini games such as poker or darts, races with time trials, customization such as clothing stores and barbers and many, many more. Mafia III does not have any of these features, making the world feel redundant and not open at all. Sure, there are gatherings of NPCs who converse with one another, street performers, drunkards and sometimes prostitutes (which you can't interact with), but in all honesty? They are just there to make the world feel like it's alive. To simulate a "thriving, open world." This is a game where you're given access to fast cars, but also a game where there aren't any races(!) That's like a gun without bullets! There are some racist aspects of the world, like when police officers look at you just because you're black, but I didn't once see any police officers harassing black people, as they showed in the trailers. Racism is still a very controversial aspect of this game, as the main derogatory racist terms are used very often and are often emphasized. It's quite shocking sometimes.

The devs called the world of New Bordeaux the "main" character. Although as far as I can tell, this "main character" absolutely has no character.

I played through the campaign and all of the side missions in 38 hours, taking my time and not rushing. I played stealthily a lot of the time, which probably made the game longer. That is terrible for the price I paid! 38 hours to FINISH an "open world" game? With all of the side content excluding collectibles? I probably spent 38 hours playing darts in GTA 5. What a joke!


Mafia III is a gritty and bloody tale of revenge and pain, with some heavy racism thrown in the mix. It's honestly an enticing story and definitely its strongest suit. I feel that the story was very well orchestrated as a documentary (quite unique) but that there was also quite some "filler" in between. The story is probably the best part about this game, as it is with all Mafia games, but don't go in expecting Mafia II.


Sal Marcano is the main antagonist. Throughout the whole game, he is made out to be the most relentless, baddest mother-♥♥♥♥♥♥ in the game and YOU are supposed to feel as if killing him is the penultimate goal.

He's only really a "ruthless mob boss" once. The only time you ever see Sal Marcano kill anyone is in the intro, when the black mob is betrayed. For the REST of the game he is sat inside a single room, making phone calls, talking to his son and drinking whiskey. That's not what you expected, is it? The trailers didn't show that, did they? You thought he'd be out gunning ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ down with a thompson alongside his son because he's supposed to be the bad guy. Supposed to be.

The facial expressions and tonality of his voice elaborate on the emotions he is feeling (great voice acting!) but sitting down throughout the whole game, waiting for Lincoln to come to you and not taking any PHYSICAL action? Sure sounds like the baddest mother ♥♥♥♥♥♥ in the game all-right. He has influence over other people, but not once does he exit his room to hunt down Lincoln himself. Instead, relying on everyone else around him. I thought people were supposed to be scared of this man? Not his minions? I thought this man was supposed to scare people? This man hides away at the top of his Casino, drinking whiskey. Good depiction of his influence as a mob boss -- bad depiction of himself as a man of action.

-

Rememeber in the trailer where it showed you can fight people in the arena and kill members of the KKK? Those are only one mission, and are not the main parts!

The arena is a very small part of another level, made only to progress said level. There are 3 targets, with the same AI. You can "woo" the crowd or "insult" the crowd, but this does nothing - it is useless as an addition to the game, made only to fuel the hype.

The members of the Klan in the single mission about the Klan are not even your main targets, and again, is a useless addition, simply made to add content to the game and fuel the racial controversy further.

I honestly felt very misled by the trailers. I was pissed when I learned what these parts really were: filler.


The main missions are very, very repetitive. You have to take down district underbosses in order to take down the district lieutenants/capos. To do this, you have to go through the ordeal of smashing valuables, killing people, stealing money, disrupting events and interrogating informers. It gets very tedious because they literally COPY and PASTE these missions to every other district whilst changing the name of what it is! For example: "disrupt the meeting" in Downtown becomes "disrupt the orgy" in the French Ward. Honestly, the repetition got to me at one point and made me want to play solely to reach the end. I wasn't excited to kill Sal Marcano anymore. I just wanted the game to be over.

The gunplay in this game is VERY satisfying, but the stealth mechanics in this game are the barest of bare. The AI are incredibly stupid when it comes to stealth - even on "hard" difficulty which doesn't seem to change anything apart from adding health to the AI (which still felt piss-easy). Their vision cones are terrible and their "logic" just isn't there. There were multiple instances where I should have been seen. But alas, this is not a stealth game. It takes almost half a game to acquire a gun with a suppressor though, and even then, it's a "favour" from one of your 3 underbosses!

Burke, Vito, and Cassandra are who you will assign districts to. They will reward you with perks, "markers" (which buy services such as shutting off the phones), upgrades and weapons. Something I should warn you about is:

YOU CAN'T UNLOCK ALL OF THE PERKS OR THE UPGRADES!

Depending on who you assigned a district to, that upgrade is linked to them. So I ended up finishing the game with upgraded health from Vito, no upgraded bomb ammo from Burke (because of the amount of districts I didn't give to him), and a fully upgraded car but no races to use the car in!

Not being able to have all the perks or upgrades is VERY stupid!!

The side missions don't even work properly. They bugged out and wouldn't let me finish them, so I couldn't even receive "max earn" (income) from the underbosses -- "Steal the boat" - the boat doesn't spawn. "Steal the truck" - the truck doesn't spawn. Even on the third and final stage of any of these side missions, the objective pops up, but the map marker doesn't, making them feel redundant and making you feel stupid.

This game is littered with bugs. From falling through floors to being detected through walls to collision on objects that shouldn't have collision on them to FLYING through the air in a car because you hit a BUMP... I'm not joking!


+ Great story, portrayed as a documentary

- World feels dead

- Game is too short for the money

- Misleading gameplay

- VERY repetitive gameplay, to the point of boredom

- Not being able to unlock all the perks/upgrades

- Bugged side missions and other game breaking bugs

Wait for a sale. A very discounted sale. 5/10

You spend an hour clearing the enemies and junk out of the vault. Like you do in a settlement.

Then you spend another hour doing a fetch-quest and placing down generators and terminals (like you do in a settlement) so that you can conduct "experiments" on the vault-dwellers.

When you finally become Overseer, you realise that you can't actually... oversee. You're given this huge space to build your vault and there isn't a tutorial or incentive for building it. There also isn't a tutorial for maintaining a community underground - which you can't do anyway! The only thing you can do is build..

Say it with me now... Like you do in a settlement.

Get Fallout Shelter lol.

Everyone is outlining the performance issues and online DRM but no one is actually reviewing the game itself.

UPDATE: Updating the review as of 30/05/2016 - the update for Marrakesh has fixed the issue for target names and parameters not being shown in Contracts mode. The launcher now has support for higher resolutions. Performance has been slightly improved in certain areas.

UPDATE 2: Updating the review as of 04/12/2016 - the end of the first season is here, and with it comes the news of more seasons being planned! They have added a feature to be able to play offline with all your unlocks! All you have to do is be online to unlock them - a partial DRM fix! I've adjusted a minor section in the review - you cannot hide weapon in food crates and carry them around as a waiter (although it was in the gameplay trailers) - sorry about that.

(Obviously the online DRM annoys some people and the performance is choppy in some areas but that shouldn't cast a shadow over the gameplay). I managed to enjoy the game regardless, so here is a review of the gameplay:

I haven't played much (4 hours as of writing) but I can certainly make some points based on gameplay. This is based on the Paris level available on release. TL;DR @ bottom.

HITMAN plays very similarly to the original Hitman games but also incorporates mechanics from Absolution such as the cover system and a few borrowed animations. Instinct is back but that stupid thing 47 does with his hand over his head is gone; it's literally a wall hack but you can turn it off if you so wish. You can choose the equipment and clothing 47 takes with him before the mission, and depending on your "mastery level" you can also choose where to enter. Mastery level is a value that increases once you've completed certain challenges. You can gain Mastery of a level by completing all of its challenges and earning an achievement.

When you're in a level you can press F1 to view the challenges. From here, you can mark a challenge so you can complete it. The game also presents challenges to you if you're in the right circumstance. When carrying out a challenge, the game points you where to go and what to do. It very much holds your hand, which can be patronising. I'm sure you can turn this off though. The HUD is a little "too" helpful by displaying literally every opportunity and highliting every possible pickup, but can be turned off. I really do feel that this game tends to make it easier for you, removing any sense of independence you might have unless turning off options such as the HUD and hints.

A few interesting features available to the player vary from the ability to conceal your weapon in things such as bins and food crates (sorry, I thought you could do this, but you can't) to setting off a fire alarm so the civilians are evacuated. The AI worry me a lot since actions which should be obvious don't seem to phase them. They feel dumbed down. The AI go about their patrol paths and investigate unusual behaviour, but peripheral vision seems to be obsolete. You'd be surprised with the kind of stupid sh#t you can get away with due to poor AI and sometimes delayed reactions. While wearing a disguise, the head of that group will see through it. You'll need to avoid these "enforcers" as they can blow your cover - I like this system in comparison to everyone seeing through your disguise.

The level feels very open and alive and the NPCs all seem to have a role within that world. The map is huge, allowing for endless replayability, planning and exploration. NPCs feel believable. I would say only the static NPCs (such as the generic guests) feel, well.. static. Events within the level make the level feel so much more deep. This can range from conversations between guards about the multiverse theory to walking in front of a camera as a reporter does her job, only to get mad at you for interrupting. This is of course all based on the Paris level, but I'm sure this will be applicable to future missions. I felt myself often exploring the level and just taking in the beautiful scenery and architecture of the world. It feels real.

I'm really impressed by the vast majority of ways you can kill your targets. The methods sometimes really go above expectations and make you question if that really just happened while also giving you a sense of accomplishment for actually pulling off "the big kill". They really are unique in comparison to just garotting or shooting your target and definitely leave a lasting impression.

On top of the base game is contracts mode, escalation mode and elusive targets. Contracts allows you to choose up to five targets and set up ways for them to be killed, so others can attempt to do so. Or you can attempt their challenges. It's different from Absolution because Absolution had parameters like "don't miss any shots", allowed you to choose NPC costumes at the beginning, there's no money and no weapon upgrades. You can't tell what the target's name is because the game doesn't tell you, so you don't know which weapon or method to kill them with. Absolution had a better contracts mode. Escalation mode first provides you with a target, a way to kill them and a disguise to wear. After this is done, you are tasked with the same mission but with added parameters (such as opening a safe or killing another target). More and more parameters get added each time you complete it. It really is quite fun. Elusive targets are targets that will appear for a short time that you can kill. IO sets this up.

Notes - my review is based on gameplay but I will talk about the issues everyone else is talking about too:

* Currently there are DRM server issues meaning that you can't complete challenges whilst being offline. The game kicked me back to the main menu after disconnecting me and didn't make a save. I lost some progress which annoyed me. So you NEED to be online to complete challenges, which is very stupid. This isn't a problem anymore!

* There are technical problems relating to the graphics, but this really only seems to be active in the yacht mission during the prologue. Being near the NPCs on the boat drops a lot of frames but being near at least 3 times as many in Paris doesn't drop any frames (for me, anyway).

* The launcher locks some graphics settings. I had to add start up options to the game in order to play above 1080p (1440p). This isn't a problem anymore!

* This game is episodic. (I don't care about it. I actually like it this way.)

PROS:

+ Very fun gameplay, feels solid
+ Lots of interesting ways to kill targets
+ Equipment/weapon selection
+ World feels very alive and real
+ Huge maps
+ Lots of fun challenges
+ Back to how Hitman games used to be
+ Contracts mode, Escalation mode, Elusive targets

CONS:

- Performance issues (will probably be fixed soon)
- Online DRM (You can play offline now with your unlocks!)
- Locked graphics settings in the launcher for some people (as of right now)
- Game holds your hand, dumbed down HUD/hints
- AI need some "logic" tweaks
- Absolution had a better contracts mode
- A few reused animations (there are some new ones though)
- Wall hack instinct (can be turned off)

NEUTRAL:

+ - The game is episodic. Opinion based.

TL;DR - how a Hitman game should be, loads of content, loads of ways to kill targets, really fun. Suffers from performance issues, DRM issues and certain gameplay mechanics.

Now I hope you'll excuse me because I need to use the bathroom.

I was sneaking in public and an NPC said "we can see you!"

Then I found some children and one of them said "if I die, I want you to eat me".

10/10 realism