Évaluations récentes de Nitrode256

First level:

I'm constantly getting shot up like swiss cheese, and I'm instantly healing every bullet wound with the magic health power-ups my teammate hands out like candy. Now, I'm a gamer, so that's all fine and good to me. Aside from two nagging thoughts: 1. Why can't *I* carry a seemingly-infinite supply of them like he does? And 2. This is FAR more of a bothersome chore than the magical auto-recovery mechanic from like...every other modern Call of Duty....and nearly every other remotely modern FPS...

A few minutes later, the same guy (I think. Who can tell?) with the endless supply of magical bullet-hole-mending candy gets shot by ONE bullet. Meanwhile, I'm fully recovered from about a hundred fresh bullet holes. And with his ONE bullet wound, he makes a big melodramatic deal, he NEVER TOUCHES HIS MAGIC HEALING CANDY HIMSELF, and I have to put up with a big whiny "drag him to safety", "will he live or die?" soap opera sequence. All because he's too stupid to use the same healing item he's spent the entire level carrying around.

But that's NOT the bigger problem with Call of Duty: WWII.

The bigger problem is: Gritty, graphic, realistic depictions of World War 2 are...(surprise, surprise) NOT F***ING ENTERTAINING!!!! They're not even remotely original, either.

(I got this as part of a bundle with better games, so I don't really mind it being garbage,)

It's like House of the Dead or Time Crisis, but way cuter.

Perfect example of Steam's binary "good/bad" ratings being terribly insufficient. I have to choose "recommend", but really, this is merely a 7/10... (And despite what my "play time" on Steam may indicate, this was really my second playthrough. I'd already played through it once before, several years ago, on PS3.)

First of all, I have disagree with many of the critics: The story here is a trivial pile of ultra-pretentious garbage. There’s very little to it, and what little IS there is nothing more than the classic trademark of amateur story hour:

Just blindly equate “dead/dying characters (the more, the better)” with “cheap, easy, magical formula for unlimited ‘I’m artistic!!!’ bonus points”, and even you too can fool people into thinking you put actual effort into it! Really, we’re talking plain-vanilla textbook “How to Manufacture Artificially-’Artsy’ Plots For Dummies, Twelfth Edition”.

Luckily for this game, I don’t care about videogame stories (beyond what’s forced upon me)…

Pros:
- Expertly-crafted puzzles that blend seamlessly into the game’s world. The puzzles never feel overtly like puzzles, and yet, they are enjoyable, rewarding puzzles to be solved. This should not be understated – this is what’s good about the game, and it’s VERY good. It’s the real meat of Brothers, and the main reason it’s “plus” instead of “minus”.
- The fundamental “control two characters at the same time” mechanic is the real key that drives the brilliance of all of the puzzles. Despite a small learning curve, it’s a highly original idea that ultimately works exceptionally well.
- Absolutely gorgeous visuals, even for being nearly a decade old. That’s impressive.
- None of the puzzles are frustrating.
- A handful of optional achievement-earning puzzles give the game a little bit of much-needed replayability.

♥♥♥♥:
- It’s easily completed in only about 3 hours.
- If you already know what to do, the movement of both the player characters and NPCs suddenly starts to feel agonizingly slow.
- While the puzzles are good, there’s not many of them. If the game allowed you to play as fast as you could problem-solve, without artificially slowing you down, it probably would’ve only taken about an hour to complete, if even that.
- The throwaway story (if you can even call it a story) is forced upon you. No skipping! “Yuu MOOST vatch zee stoorie, yaa!”
- All the puzzles are easy. They’re satisfying, but very easy.
- The ONLY difficulty to be had in the game whatsoever is finding a small handful of optional Achievement puzzles. And that means re-walking paths you’ve already walked...very...very...slooooowlllyyyy…..

Overall, it’s an otherwise excellent game that suffers the unfortunate burden of minimal content and a force-fed amateurish story.

Easily some of the absolute most gorgeous, original, inspired artwork and animation I've ever seen in a real-time...umm..."product"? And I genuinely mean that so very strongly that it pains me to have anything less-than glowing to say about it. I REALLY wanted to like this one...

Now, I already expected going in, for this to be very light on gameplay. And I don't always even hold that against a game: For example, I very much enjoyed Journey and Scanner Sombre, both of which are arguably mere walking simulators. But holy cow, I was still not prepared for just how TEDIOUSLY BOOORING this one is!! Other reviews say it's very short, and maybe it technically is, but it certainly feels like an absolute eternity!

To be fair, there are some light puzzle elements here. After awhile. But easily about 90% of the time, all you're really doing is walking forward or occasionally watching something non-interactive (like falling...a loong time, sliding down a bunch of slopes, being lifted by wind, etc., all frequently with no input even being registered). But mostly just walking forward. And walking forward. And...walking forward some more...And...more forward walking on top of that. And then you walk forward. Holding left/right on the DPad has never before felt like such a chore.

On top of that, even during what passes for its "puzzle" sections, it can often be very unclear what is/isn't an actual platform. The "ferris wheel" is a particularly notable example of this "swing-and-a-miss" attempt at gameplay.

Oh, and the "simple control reminders illustrated through universal icons" claimed in the title's description range from unclear to downright wrong if your controller isn't XBox-branded. So much for the simple, well-designed cues being "universal". The main menu's controls could stand to be more intuitive as well.

The devs REALLY need to make either a GKIDS-produced movie, or a metroidvania, or something like Limbo/Inside. Preferably ALL of the above! Seriously, I mean that as a whole-hearted complement: If they did ANY of those, it would be absolutely world-class, and my mind would be well-blown. But this, as much as I want to like it, as much as there IS to love about it, it's really nothing more than an artist's resume' with a price tag.

You're better off just watching a "playthrough" video of it and skipping the most dull parts. Should only take a few minutes.

As for the story...well, as incredibly curious as I really am to see everything else that's in this title, I just haven't been able to sit through enough it it yet to reach the end. But based on what I've seen so far, here's my TENTATIVE impression of the story, subject to future revision:

*Ahem*...

I'm not sure what super-chronic everyone else here is smoking, but there's really no story here [that I've seen so far]. At one point, you walk past statues of sad-looking supermodel girls and, presumably, that's supposed to be artistic lingo for "Sad-girl is sad." Ok, yea. Great story, dude. I mean shoot, *I've* been through crippling depression in the past, I've personally related to stories of depression, but I STILL don't see any real story here beyond "Sad statues mean that sad-girl is sad." Whoa-nelly!!! We've got a regular Shakespere in the works here...And a reaaaaallly low bar for storytelling...

It's a classic-style (not quite bullet-hell) top-down sh'mup. You know what to expect.

Pros:
- Prettiest Raiden ever.
- Possibly the prettiest top-down sh'mup.
- DualShock 4 works for me out-of-the-box. (FWIW, Leaderboards work for me too. Maybe they fixed the bugs someone else mentioned?)
- Gameplay's intact.

♥♥♥♥:
- No support for vertical monitor orientation. Learn from GameCube's Ikaruga, dudes!!! Even my mom's Windows PC has a portrait mode these days.
- Enormous amount of....random crap....to the left and right of the screen. Very distracting.
- No in-game options. Have to exit to the main menu.
- Dear god, SOMEBODY SHUT THE NPCs UP!!!! THEY NEVER STOP TALKING!!!! Who ever thought anyone would ever care one word they're CONSTANTLY chattering on about??? (Luckily, you can shut them up in the sound options.)

I'm only 10 minutes and 3 levels into this, but already I can tell it's a real winner.

Pros:
1. Very fun, great gameplay.
2. One of the most well-polished games I've played in a long time.
3. Gorgeous graphical style.
4. IT HAS A CHARACTER NAMED HOEBEAR!!!!! Hoebear!!!!! For real!!! It's even pronounced like you'd think!!!

♥♥♥♥:
1. Not nearly enough people have recognized this game's greatness!!!!
2. Being from MS, this doesn't recognize DualShock 4 out-of-the-box. But no worries, just use DS4Windows and you're golden: https://github.com/Ryochan7/DS4Windows

Hoebear!!!

In a word: Unfinished.

The game certainly has real potential, but is clearly incomplete. It's bug-filled right from the start, extremely rough-around-the-edges at best, and in some ways feels stuck in early/mid-90's DOS-gaming design.

- Various UI glitches, especially during the tutorial.

- Progress during tutorial isn't saved. Replaying after exiting an unfinished tutorial can lead to more UI glitches.

- Strange invisible walls in the tutorial.

- Tutorial overall feels extremely buggy and incomplete.

- Tutorial is very poorly integrated into the main game. And by "very poorly" I mean "barely at all". Just as one example, once I started the "real" game, the furniture store (necessary for your first objective) was no longer next to my store. Instead, it took what felt like ages to find it in a completely different place. And no map, as far as I could tell. Whole bunch of other things "magically" changed after the tutorial too, like my character's wardrobe. And why is it even necessary to kick me back to the main menu after the tutorial?

- Why is my store's name and crest mounted on the city's tax/order-pickup building instead of on my actual store?

- Player customization options are half-baked (mostly just a selection of tattoos) and seem fairly pointless given the first-person-only nature of the game.

- Using the "hot bar" (quick items) should be simple, but instead it feels clumsy, awkward and poorly designed. Maybe it's just buggy?

- Controls desperately need streamlined: Having keyboard shortcuts is great...as an OPTION...but this isn't 1991: Modern games, even on a PC, should never require new players to memorize lots of keyboard commands just to handle the necessary core mechanics.

- Controls STILL desperately need streamlined: Even if you make heavy use of Steam's controller configuration and a Steam controller, this game is still extremely hostile to controllers. Again, this may have been par-for-the-course, and even justifiable, back in early 90's DOS gaming, but now, well over twenty years later, it's just unprofessional and unacceptable.

- I haven't gotten to any combat yet, and I doubt I ever will unless things improve...But based on what I've seen so far, I shudder to think how painful it will be to attempt combat given the state this is currently in.

It's a huge shame, really. This is such a good START to what could be a truly great game. It's clear that a lot of effort went into it already. All they have to do is polish it up and make it presentable. But with it no longer in early access, and with reviews saying basically the same about the first Shoppe Keep game, I can't help doubting that the devs even know what polishing it would entail, let alone that they they ever will.

You have to try the game!!!

It's free, but I totally would've paid real monies for this. It's that solid.

Only downside: Having to manually enable controller is kinda an unnecessary pain, as is having to manually configure it to use the DPad.

I came for the goat, I stayed for the gameplay.

Before playing this, It would be easy to dismiss it as a big joke, trying to cheaply cash in on "lol, goats!" But that would be a mistake. Even goats aside, this is a surprisingly good, solid multiplayer FPS overall. It's very much a love letter to the fast-paced, frantic heyday of Unreal Tournament and Quake 3 Arena, and it's clear the developers are UT/Q3A fans and have been putting a great deal of care and talent into this.

But I still love the goat aspect, too. The goats add levity to the atmosphere, guarantee the characters don't feel generic in design (no risk of "yawn, yet more armor-clad muscle men like EVERY other game out there"). And always seeing the characters as goats constantly reminds players to just have fun - it's only a game! - and not take it too seriously like many other multiplayer FPS crowds often do. And maybe it's just me, but goats running around with guns just never stops being funny.

Amazing! I can't believe people were playing this all the way back in 1993! It looks more like something from 23 years later!