Recent reviews by Elohimbaa

I love the Multiplayer. Who cares if it is balanced? I just wish multiplayer cards were more viable in 2-player mode.

What pains me (again) is that some builds are impossible to set up if key cards are missing. Balatro has a similar problem. In Vampire Survivors, you would just re-roll again and again and are able to block cards, routes you don't want to go. Here and in Balatro, there is not much if anything you can do to increase the chances of finding cards you are interested in.
Specific examples:
- Went for Necro "support" build with another Necro, intending to increase vulnerable and weak effects. Neither of us ever found a card that applies weak in the entire run
- Went for Ironclad "support" build trying to go full block. Didn't find the tank card, which is ok because it is rare, but not a single Juggernaut, Bodyslam or anything useful dropped in Act 2 and 3. Useless attack cards without any meaningful interactions.

I get that, for these types of games, it is expected to go with what you find, but at least for group play, it would be more fun if there was a way to influence what you find, or trade cards as a Rest option or after every big boss, or ...

This game really is the worst kind of good

I never really warmed up to the two "minigames" that are the core mechanic besides making choices in the dialogue, but it worked well enough and supplemented an engaging storyline

Small but helpful spoiler:
You will get the "progression" upgrades in the boss dungeons

Fun game. I played with slight auto-aim on and it made the combat very fluent

I think that, as we get older, we are harder to be impressed by new stories, because we will often recognize them as new iterations of tales we've already seen, read, watched, played, experienced. For example, once you've followed Naruto's journey to become Hokage and seen youngsters beat up big baddies with the power of love and friendship often enough, new entries in the genre are little more than bland remixes of the same formula. More and more of your time is occupied by following boring filler.
The less frequent moments of joy and wonder in the face of something brand new, awe-inspiring, beautiful innvoation like Clair Obscur become more and more precious.

Now in a self-referencing kind of way, I'll spare us all the time and get to the point:
What a shame that a supposedly great story and soundtrack are held back by a gameplay formula so old, so dated that I couldn't bring myself to play even past the first hour mark.

If you've outgrown the Kingdom Hearts / FF formula of the old days, I can't imagine a world where you would make it through the game multiple times?!? without losing your sanity.

10/10, one of the most engaging games with story in years

good gameplay
good jraphics
good music
good characters
intriguing story so far
good fighting gameplay loop
"pick your fight" style random encounters
variety both in enemies and character moveset/mechanics
I also LOVE that there is no mana or stamina bs to keep track of
-> very much worth it if you have got the (according to howlongtobeat) 30-50 hours to spare. Very unique world and game

Update after beating the game:
Difficulty scaling late in the game could have been better. There should be an option for "specific enemies" to scale with your level. I recommend enabling the 99k or 999k damage cap for proper "absolute cinema" when you face enemies that are relevant to the story, and to not rely on a one-shot build.
The story is a 10/10 all the game through, so was the fighting system.

Half-Life 2 with Skyrim Leveling System and some survival/crafting mechanisms built in.
It started out okay, then had some very high highs (in a group of 4) and some stretched out "mids" in between.
This game is not made to be rushed, it's about engaging with the missions, pondering what to do next or, alternatively, looking through guides a bunch.
It is well worth playing, alone or with friends, but will take time.
However, for me it's still just a very special 8/10 because the game requires a sense of direction that I don't possess to be a 9 or 10

8/10 considering its age.
Good looks and music, no bugs (yet), fast loading times, fluent combat.
The world itself seems pretty small compared to Skyrim, but the original is an older title after all. This includes cities, which are usually divided into districts without much going on.
The level-up system is a bit confusing, and I spent about 1 hour understanding and practicing to pick locks

9/10
A well-crafted action adventure game that is driven by its setting, scenery, combat and dialogue.
After playing mostly open-world or endless games like Witcher 3, CP77, Factorio, PoE, Palworld or Valheim for many years, this accessible and refined experience left me very impressed - it is what Sony does best after all.
The game offers just enough objectives to explore besides the main quest without overwhelming or getting stale.
The setting is driven home 100%.
The combat is satisfying and offers many options for combos.
Exploration was mostly fun.
What I enjoyed most were the scenery and the dialogue.
The late/post game did offer some incentive to keep going, although going for 100% can be really tedious.
The game ran smoothly on 100-120 fps on a 3080 in 2.5k. It crashed once in 34 hours playtime.
I won't say much else in terms of what I enjoyed to not spoil anything.

What I didn't like:
- You should definitely watch a short synopsis on the original God of War Trilogy on Youtube. Avoid spoilers
- Climbing, crouching and Triple A zone transitions were a bit slow
- The story playing out as it did seems a bit cheesy considering it all happens right in the middle of Midgard under everyone's nose. My headcanon is that the world is much smaller in game than it would be in "reality"

Best Metroidvania I've played