Here’s wave 2 of game reviews. This time it was mostly Game Pass games I was curious about. Plus I rewatched @MrGervaisWrites’ God of War review and finally finished that.
Splinter Cell: Double Agent is better at guiding the player than previous games, but parts seemed rushed, barebones or punitive; others had a story to tell with the level design. I still quit at a point that required pixel-perfect planning.
God of War (2018)’s old-timey action-adventure half primed me to engage solely at the level of spectacle. But it adds modern expectations about engagement with mechanics and upgrades. I tolerated the 45 different moves available for purchase; I felt sad every time I saw an upgrade screen.
I tried 3 hours of Final Fantasy 13-2. It’s another FF13, but with more complex JRPG mechanics. The story is, somehow, MORE jittery underexplained embarrassing aesthetics. The additional complexity would grate if you play the whole game, but it helped during the beginning of the game.
Greedfall is a eurojank Dragon Age. I played this on Gamepass a lot longer than I planned because I wanted to reach the scenic New World* on the cover image. Nope! It’s all towns and goopy sidequests for the first 8 hours or so! *Warning: lots of unexamined colonialism.
I streamed Remnant: From the Ashes on Xbox for a couple of runs to see whether I wanted to come back to it later. I am intrigued; my impression was: rogue-like Gears of War. I’m going to come back later on PC so I can aim with a gyro. Another @docsquiddy recommendation.
I don’t play horror games much; I tried The Medium for an hour because it has high-end Xbox Series X graphics and I wanted to see it stream to a One S. Answer: grass gets smudged but lighting survives. I quit when I made it to a Scary Hospital. Seen enough of those in my life!
I tried Fallout 76 for a couple of hours. It … uh … it’s Fallout 3 and 4 again, but with less story and more crafting. Both are ancillary to the world exploration that Bethesda is actually good at, so I might come back. Maybe. I’ve played a lot of 3D Fallout in my life.
Dauntless is a breezier, easier-to-pick up Monster Hunter. I like that idea! So I tried it again, solo this time. But the first few monsters were still boring. Back in the hub, deluged by free-to-play noise, I could see the game in my imagination is far different from reality.
My nephew was into Minecraft for a bit so I tried to get the whole family into it. I tried the Xbox version for the first time in a decade and … Minecraft is still great! My kid spent the whole time comparing it to Subnautica, which he has played a lot more of.