Recent reviews by Super Cosmic Space Magnet

I was initially very hesitant to buy this game - and many of my reasons have proven to be correct now that I'm playing it:

Character models: Some of the character anatomy is just.. Really bad. Law's face, Feng's back (???), and the cold lifeless eyes of particularly the women in the game (its forbidden for them to frown or something I guess, while the men are allowed to look like they're at the end stage of a particularly bad Taco Bell experience when they're particularly angry).

Particle effects: Readability is important. Even though it has Electrics and laserbeams, characters haven't generally had massive screen-filling wooshlines and trails behind their moves. I find the massive particle effects pretty ugly, but more importantly they clutter the screen and make it difficult to see what's even going on. The whole screen flashing with sparkles whenever a heat thing happens gets pretty tiresome.

Mindless offense: Aggression was core to the game's design and the devs have been open about it. Even characters that previously struggled to open up defensive opponents have now been given 50:50 tools that strongly favour the aggressor. Throws have been made harder to break, rage arts are MUCH safer, and for most characters Heat mode gives you access to even stronger pressure tools. At times it feels like everyone is Josie from Tekken 7.

"I am here to interrupt your flow": Rage Arts were great fun when they were sharp and snappy, but anmations towards the end of T7 got longer - and they're now even longer than before in T8. Being in the middle of an intense match and then having to just go make a cup of tea because someone's doing their stupid super move is lame.


While all this is true, I have still found myself enjoying Tekken 8. While the Heat system I believe is ill-conceived, it is preferable to 7's system where some characters had a meter system and others didn't. The game is still Tekken too, characters have the same complexity that you'd expect from the series, and the ability to self-express through combat remains superb. It's also where the bulk of the playerbase is now, so if you want the Tekken experience you've not got much other choice.

The stages are also worth a mention. Not only are they absolutely gorgeous, but this game finally introduces the Jukebox - a library with all the Tekken music ever made, which you can assign to each stage (and final round). This was only previously possible with mods (and hoping that someone had uploaded the music you wanted somewhere) so having it as an in-game tool is fantastic. It's a tremendous quality of life improvement, and has done more for my enjoyment of the game than any other feature.

Lastly, and least importantly, the story. Tekken 8's story mode is the worst story I have ever seen in any game - it was so juvenile that I went full circle from disgust to amazement. It is the filtered and concentrated essence of crap. I absolutely loathed it, and recommend it only to people who desperately want the 100% completion achievement, or people whose minds have succumbed to the anime rot. Buuuuuuuuuut it's a Tekken game - story was never going to be the reason I picked it up, and being upset about the story in a Tekken game is like being upset at the wine selection in a McDonalds.

At its core, Tekken 8 is a very competent and visually stunning 3D fighter with memorable characters and reasonably good character balance. I expect to be playing this for a long time.

This 'game' is a companion piece to an exhibition by Serpentine Galleries in London, and is as textbook an example as can be found of artists attempting to create games while having absolutely no comprehension of how they are made, how they work, why people play them, or what elements about games have catapulted them into being the largest entertainment medium on the planet.

A criticism of the game's artistic merits and the messages its creators intend to convey would be pointless, as I did not tolerate this software long enough to form a comprehensive opinion. The technical faults are so outrageous that it was completely insufferable: Hideous UI; appalling menu interface; broken and slippery geometry; VERY rudimentary sound design (generic Unreal Engine sound effect for jumping..?); the game runs like tar (ultra settings Tekken 7, but this attempt at the Avant Garde is unsurvivable for my machine apparently); and it also commits the cardinal sin of being a walking simulator.

Despite the alarming snippet about NFTs, it seems it's really just talking about taking screenshots and uploading them either for other players to see, or for people to see in the gallery in Kensington. I certainly don't think this is a scam game by any means, just a well-intentioned but poorly executed art project.

I recommend this DLC, but I do want to put a few BIG ASTERIXES next to it because I feel my expectations from this DLC were not accurate in spite of my extensive reading. I'm hoping that by collecting my thoughts here someone else might be able to read it and have a better idea of what to expect.

With this DLC you are getting the Shifter class, which is a Druid that substitutes spellcasting for permanent and more powerful shapeshifting. This is a nice l'il thing. More options and classes are a wonderful addition to the game and I hope to see more of it.

You also get Ulbrig, who is the headline act of the DLC - and also the part that I feel let down by. WoTR is made excellent by its FANTASTIC cast of companions; not only are they all wonderfully voiced and complex, but they also bicker and interact with each other. They'll chat during rests, a feature which gives so much replayability as you take different party compositions and see what they think of eachother. You'll hear Daeran pick at Arue, Regil insult Sosiel, Woljif crack wise with Seelah, Lann generally being an upbeat jokester, and everyone pointing out how obvious it is that Camelia is a sociopath. None of this happens with Ulbrig.

Ulbrig's dialogue is very much tacked on at the end of other conversations other party members have, and as a result his lines are entirely superfluous. It really just comes down to, at the end of a conversation, him saying something that boils down to: "YEAH". He's also not a particularly smart or insightful man, something which his voice actor captures with his slurred and perpetually drunk-sounding speech. He adds very little more to the party in storytelling or banter beyond what a Mercenary adds. I had hoped that, in Act 3 when you go to Old Sarkoris, he'd have heaps to say. After all, you visit Wintersun! You visit the Druid! You have the trial at Gorrum! This should be the moment Ulbrig has so much to say, where he can really show you something about life in Sarkoris that you hadn't previous experienced, and he just... doesn't. It's one or two lines of speech, and that's it. He has no reactivity at all to the Gorrum temple.

He does have personal quests. You go to an isolated location, do some quite mundane quest stuff stuff, and it's over. It's fine. It's not bad or anything, but his character has neither the charm nor intrigue nor interconnectedness with the rest of the party that make the original cast so fantastic. They did not get any of the original voice actors back in to voice new dialogue that addresses Ulbrig directly in the same way they interact with eachother, which becomes notable by its absence. It all comes together to make him feel lesser in comparison to the others. He's more than a mercenary, but less than a companion.

To point out flaws is not the same as to hate something, though. Ulbrig does have some content to him, and as a bruisery frontline fighter he fills a niche that the normal companions in their default builds otherwise do not. His class is simple and very fun to use, and the DLC is not expensive. It doesn't make the game worse by its inclusion, and Owlcat do seem to be a dev worth supporting. The DLC is good. It's not great, but it's good. Just go into it with tempered expectations.

The Last Spell is a game I enjoyed, but is also difficult to recommend. The sound and sprites are phenomenal, and the game is (unless you use the optional Boundless mode) very challenging. Each map takes around 3 hours to complete however, and losing your run because you had no idea what the boss was going to be and didn't build the right tools feels awful. For example: Map 4 is literally unbeatable unless you build at least one movement-focused hero, but for it to be comfortable you'll need more. Movement is not something you have really needed in previous maps, so getting 4 hours into the map only to be engaged in a boss battle you have no hope of beating is rough.

The Apocalypse modes do make for decent replay value and ways to challenge yourself, but even without those modifiers I think this game is best suited for players who enjoy the feeling of throwing themselves at challenging scenarios and failing until they learn how to succeed. It also bears mentioning that the metaprogression system means you'll initially find yourself thrown into maps without many of the tools to succeed. A player will therefore need to be comfortable with failure in order to see the game through to the end.

I also feel that the game needs more content. It only has 5 maps, and while Apocalypse modes do increase the difficulty for replay value, there is no survival/endless mode. The monster variety is excellent and the existing maps do provide significant and engaging tactical challenges. The soundtrack for the game is also worth talking about, because while it is great overall I did find the lack of variety in the battle themes to be very grating. The metal music is good, but I was desperate to mute it and put on literally anything else after a while since there are only I think two tracks for the whole game. Fortunately the settings menu does allow you to mute just the music, so you can replace it with whatever you want.

I did enjoy my time with The Last Spell, but whether I'd recommend it to someone is down to how well I know them. You wouldn't be wrong to call this game a miserable slog, sorta like Darkest Dungeon - and much like Darkest Dungeon the extent to which the art and difficulty overcome the game's grind is entirely subjective. For me it was worth it, but I completely understand that it won't be for everyone.

Wrath of the Righteous is one of those games that deserves to have youtubers crawling over each other to make six hour long video essays exploring every inch of its impressive girth. It has so many exceptional aspects that are individually worth talking about; from its exquisite soundtrack, the incredible voice acting, the compelling narrative, and the slavish devotion to letting players customise the game. Together they collectively form what I think is the most memorable and exciting game of the decade.

Writing this Steam review is hard, I wrote and deleted many paragraphs. So much of what it does is worth your time and interest, but only detailing some of it felt like criticism by omission of the rest. Also I am not paid to write, and nobody would want to read a sprawling written essay of one random gamer's experience with the game. I will summarize.


The only people I would not recommend this game to are people who have reading difficulties, or people who can only play for short periods of time. The golden path is nearly entirely voice acted, but descriptive dialogue/flavour text/secondary characters tend not to be. It benefits from long play sessions and rapt attention.

Imagine Vermintide but you remove the colourful characterisations and the fun Skaven enemies in favour of blank slate boring-as-hell trooper dudes saying stuff like "INITIATE COMBAT STANCE MODE PATTERN BETA ALPHA" and tides of forgettable generic cultist dudes. There is no party banter and no characterisation beyond every now and again a "ey Cadia amirite?". Every map is repetitive grey cityscape (admittedly with high resolution), and the game comes at launch with a cash shop which purposefully cycles products out of stock in order to establish that lucrative fear of missing out.

If you don't give a crap about the game and just want something online you can spend time with your friends in, then much cheaper options are out there without needing to support an unethical developer. Left 4 Dead or Golf With Your Friends spring immediately to mind, but when it comes to just doing anything fun with friends there are so many options out there other than this. Alternatively if you're the kind of person who hears the word "Cadia" or sees a Krieg-pattern lasgun and immediately has to change their pants because they've just soaked themselves, then like.. yeah ok have fun I guess? Maybe this is for you?

I was given this game as a gift, and it's the only reason I'm playing it at this point. I'd really rather be doing something else, and Fatshark does not seem like a company that deserves your money. Not recommended. :/

Just from the store page I probably wouldn't have looked at this game twice, and how very wrong I would be to do so. I was given this game as a birthday present, and I have been completely engrossed by it. Monster Sanctuary is a wholesome pet battler game with Metroid-style world exploration, and yet it does some things so well that I earnestly believe Pokemon could learn a thing or two from it. Each pet has a Warcraft-style talent tree, allowing for the same pet to be built in many different ways. There are no IVs/EVs, but your talent choices are what differentiate your crab from a friend's. This variety in how each pet can be built combined with the 3v3 format allows for near-infinite combinations of pets, and rewards you for getting creative with your team builds. I have had heaps of fun in my latest playthrough doing an Aquatic-only theme for example.

If you enjoy Pokemon games or had a childhood of Digimon World 2003, this game gets my strongest possible recommendation.

I find myself starting a campaign not by going "Oh boy, which cool character do I wanna play?!" and instead going "ugh, which one do I have to play?". An extremely weak line-up of mediocre characters, with surprisingly terrible VA across the board. 5/8 factions are Demons, so get used to barely-intelligable "GRRRR" sounds spammed every time you click on a unit card or settlement. Ogres sound like Trump's impression of that disabled journalist. Orthodoxy man is a mutterer.

WITH THAT SAID, after about 40 hours of the game I have warmed to it. The realm of chaos is beautifully realized. Khorne's realm is a murder-pit, Nurgle's realm is an endurance test, Slaanesh's realm tempts you into voluntarily failing the objective because damn the rewards for doing so are good, especially early game, and Tzeentch's realm is bollocks. Feels like they really nailed it. Paint The Map is chill, but the realms of chaos give objectives that aren't just about capturing cities - while encouraging you to maintain some defensive presence at home to close rifts. I thought Immortal Empires would be the only part of this game I was looking forward to, but having played the base game I think I like it more.

I do however wish that more factions were playable for the rifts, as the current line-up is weak. Just.. C'mon, give us Karl Franz. Anyone with good voice lines. :'D This VA is almost as bad as English 3 Kingdoms.

This is the one to play.

I recommend this game to anybody who likes stories in games. I don't think I've ever felt as emotional in a game as when, in my first playthrough, I failed to pass my constitution through the Assembly. The world is incredibly rich and believable, and the variety of branches in the game's story are staggering. For its price point this game is an exquisite and very grown-up gem that I don't think I'll ever forget.