Recent reviews by PTBStraightEdge

I know it's the first of March but this is Game of the Year. Mark my words. Screenshot this review. It's a done deal.

Going through my first playthrough on Standard (Classic) now. 6.5 hours in. The story is impeccable so far. The graphical quality is amazing. The game rewards you for playing well and for being brave. Nothing is a waste of time. Everything is extremely well thought out. It's been a long time since I've played a video game that even though I had to stop playing, I didn't want to. You almost forget what a good game is like after all the years of garbage we've been given from other so-called "AAA Developers".

If you are even remotely a fan of the franchise, you would be doing yourself a disservice by not playing it.

The game has great bones. The function of the guns, the movement, the mounts, the looting, etc...just FEELS right.

The game itself is completely schizophrenic. It feels directionless. It plays as though the developers just threw spaghetti at the wall and whatever made the coolest looking shapes stayed. Highguard does several things alright but nothing well. The technical issues suck and the game should never have released in the state it did but that's not why it failed.

If this game was stripped bare, had it's technical issues fixed, was properly optimized and then used for something else, I would imagine it would find success. Someone needs to take the frame and have the focus to make it into a house worth living in.

The current team (the skeleton crew left after they nearly fired everyone) is completely out of touch, has no idea what it takes for a game to be great, externalizes all of the criticism / problems and decided a conspiracy theory where 100K people simultaneously woke up on launch pre-programmed to destroy the game is the reason Highguard failed. The reality is, fun games don't require excuses. Nobody played the game (for free remember), loved everything about it and then uninstalled it. That objectively did not happen. You can't motivate people that way. A starving man is never going to throw a delicious free meal in the garbage for the hell of it. No. This game failed on it's merits. Don't listen to anyone trying to convince you differently.

If you spam crouch in front of your dog, you can mouth ♥♥♥♥ it.

I make belts and pipes.

Zormbiss

The multiplayer is AIDS on MnK. I go positive between a 1.5 to a 2.0 K/D every game but when a controller kid does an upside down, backwards, slide levitate breaking the laws of physics with zero aim penalty...it just feels bad to play against. It's not fun. Zombies should have been in the BETA. When the full release comes out this October, MP might as well not exist for me. Got level 20 in the first couple hours. One more weekend to unlock the rewards from 20-30 and then my pain is over. CANNOT WAIT!

I've done it all. I've completed just about everything. All I have left is to unlock one more character that I want, get him to 40 and then I can take a break. I'll go to another game in the rotation and then come back to this one a little way down the road. DO NOT LISTEN TO ANYONE that tells you this game is Pay 2 Win. They are lying to you. It doesn't take 100 hours to farm an Ultimate Descendant. There is nothing exclusive to real world money in this game except for cosmetics. As far as paying money to skip certain things...that's Pay 4 Convenience AT WORST. It's a free game. I haven't spent a dime yet. I have over 60 hours in and I've done ALL of the in game content multiple times from the Story to all the Hard Void Intercepts including Molten Fortress. I'm working on Yujin now and once I get him to 40, I'll take a break. That's how it's done.

The developers don't nerf things to the ground, they just buff everything else to meet up with it. They don't ban people for finding low input / high output farms, they just make other farms more worth it. They do just about everything right. People infinitely whining about this game have almost ZERO experience with it in it's entirety. Is there a grind? Absolutely. That's the game. You don't want to grind then you better to back to Elden Ring. Is the story compelling? Absolutely not. It's forgettable at best. Is it weeb central? Unfortunately it is but if you can look past the aesthetics and are willing to put a little time into some of the things you want you can have a great game, FOR FREE, that is worth every penny if you do buy some cosmetics or the Battle Pass (which is my plan). Don't let the naysayers steal your fun.

I never really cared about the Community VS PSN situation. I was just using the outrage as an opportunity to refund the game. Everything was going fine until Sony reversed their decision the day after I submitted my request. Thanks a lot!

The game is alright. The loop gets boring fast. The balancing is awful. Everything tends to be either absolutely necessary or completely useless. Add this developer to the long list of developers that don't understand, in a PvE game, everything should be fun to use and it really doesn't matter if it's "overpowered". The game is ridiculous so let it be ridiculous.

I hope Sony does something else awful so I can try and refund this again. Wish me luck!

A faithful, quality of life packed, graphically appropriate, mechanically modern remake that is BETTER than the original in 2023 and infinitely more tolerable to a modern audience. I always told people System Shock 1 was the superior title but System Shock 2 was the better entry point to the series. I no longer have to say that. If you've ever heard of Thief, Deus Ex, BioShock, Prey, Dead Space, Cyberpunk 2077, Atomic Heart (and many more) right now is the best time to play the remake of this early 90's classic where they all drew inspiration from. Nightdive knocks it out of the park, yet again.

TLDR: Interesting but don't buy this for anything more than $2 or $3 maximum (I paid $9 regrettably). Maybe the release of further Chapters / the completion of the story might change my mind.

Interesting concept but the videos people posted about it were more interesting than actually going through it. I enjoyed the parts I enjoyed but most of the allure wore off pretty quickly after I realized it was just a walking around and exploring game with barely any puzzles or anything (there's 3 to 5 depending on what you even consider a puzzle). You can find tickets everywhere but they don't really do anything besides what you need to ride the elevators so there's no real point to try and scour everywhere for them (which I did up to about 400 spare tickets and that accounts for 90% of my game time). I feel like there could have been more interesting moments and areas although there were a few. I won't spoil the very few parts that made the game enjoyable. The only two areas that stand out is the Movie and Pool areas. The ending was...the ending. Especially considering there was almost zero world building. My advice? Don't buy this game, wait for the developer to release all the Chapters and then maybe buy it. There's not much here quite yet. I think this game cashes in on our collective desire for an interesting liminal space game but doesn't scratch the itch in it's current state.