Recent reviews by The Ogrelord

While it doesn't have a whole lot of content, what's here is overall very polished and well designed, and a lot of fun. There's a surprising amount you can do to customize your playstyle and add modifiers that make it more difficult, so it has a fair amount of replay value too. The descriptions of the different unlockables also flesh out the story a bit, which I didn't expect from a small game like this. The only real criticism I have is that the terrain collision can be a bit rough for the bullets in a few specific spots on the map. I died a couple of times from enemies shooting me when I was sure I was behind terrain. But aside from that it's a solid little arena shooter. For the low asking price, especially on sale, it can give you several (or more) afternoons of good fun.

One of the few FPS games from recent years that is genuinely innovative. While everyone else is just trying to copy the success of Fortnite and Overwatch, and CoD and Battlefield are in the corner dumping out AI slop with garbage microtransactions for a game barely even worth $40 let alone $70+, The Finals is unique and very fun.

The gunplay and movement are both solid, guns sound great and generally are very responsive. The hit detection can be a tad iffy because of the load on the servers, but it still feels very responsive overall. The weapons are all clearly distinct where in most other games a lot of the guns tend to feel very samey, here each one has a clear purpose and feels different to use. There are also a bunch of different gadgets with all sorts of different uses, and these give the game a lot of its tactical depth. Goo grenades which can create on-the-fly cover or block off paths, thermite to destroy walls, ziplines, shield domes, gravity wells, you name it.

All of that wouldn't matter too much though if it wasn't for The Finals' incredible destruction physics. All of the buildings in the game are more or less fully destructible, and they don't simply break and disappear, the structure will crumble and shift in real time. This is unlike any other FPS title out right now, and it adds so much more depth. You can break the floor under an objective to move it to a less or more defensible position, break walls to open up new lines of fire to pressure enemies from a different angle, or even bring down a whole building in order to flush out enemies. It's all physics-based, not scripted like some events in Battlefield titles, and this means the arenas will change over the course of a match in varying ways depending on how people destroy it. It has the best destruction physics since Red Faction Guerilla and the mechanics are built around it.

The game also has a pretty significant number of games modes, some more casual and some more serious like the main mode Cashout, which limits respawns more heavily and forces you to play more tactically and consider preventing enemies from reviving fallen allies. Then there's also ranked, which I haven't touched yet despite how much play time I have. It can be great both for casual and competitive, though the game does lean more towards the competitive side just due to how deep the game is.

All this with the game being free, and with a fairly generous F2P model. I haven't spent a cent but have bought a few cosmetics with the premium currency you can earn by playing, and I just recently got enough to upgrade a season pass for free. The game also runs great on Linux, and the devs are pretty good about fixing any issues that updates introduce quickly. If you aren't interested by extraction shooters like Arc Raiders and want a competitive FPS that's a bit more creative and fast paced than something like CS2, but also not an unga bunga run-n-gun game like CoD, The Finals is an excellent option.

A solid metroidvania with a lot of heart. There's a decent amount of exploration to be had as I ended up missing a handful of bosses on my playthrough, the combat is fast paced and feels good, and the game looks quite good. Obvious comparison has to be made to Hollow Knight, and while the art may not be quite as detailed or smoothly animated it's still an appealing looking game.

The biggest issue with the game is the lack of polish. It's somewhat to be expected as it's only a two person team, which makes the scope and overall quality all the more impressive, but still. I got stuck in terrain and fell out of the map a few times, there were audio bugs at a few points, there were deadzones for firing with the right stick on my controller, and parts of the animation like the character portraits simply bouncing slightly to talk show corners had to be cut somewhere.

Still, it's a solid game and at a reasonable price for what's on offer. It's competitive in what is now a very oversaturated genre, which should say a lot. That it was made by two people is also very impressive. Definitely worth a try, especially if you can get it on a sale.

Darkwood is a one-of-a-kind horror game, and not one that should be underestimated. Despite its top down perspective it's one of the scariest horror games I've played. The modern Resident Evil and Silent Hill remakes aren't even close. It's also a very difficult game, managing to blend survival horror and a large, explorable map very well.

While it may not have super realistic graphics, it still looks great, but more importantly Darkwood takes the phrase "fear of the unknown" and runs with it. Your limited cone of vision, darkness, and sound design are all combined excellently in order to make you constantly fearful of what might be just out of your vision.

The core gameplay loop is what makes the game really shine. During the day you explore, trying to gather enough supplies to prepare for the next major hurdle in your journey. Inevitably you have to return to your shelter at night, you need fuel for your generator lest you be left vulnerable in the dark. The game pulls out all the stops here to terrify you, with dozens of random events on top of enemies breaking into your shelter, making you wonder what's actually real and disrupting your fortifications. The fantastic sound design leaves you constantly afraid of what might be opening a nearby door or is making a noise outside your base, and you have to endure it until the light of dawn slowly starts to creep over the horizon.

This is one of the few games I've ever played that made me straight up quit out of fear, with the only other ones being ImScared and Amnesia: The Dark Descent. Once I got back into it I was able to continue playing to the end, but it never became dull or predictable. For such a low price this is a must-have for anyone who likes horror games.

Fun and unique gameplay, a charming story albeit not one with very deep characters or themes, nice stylized visuals, great music, and quite a bit of extra content past the main story missions.

The only real downsides I can think of are the game being pretty short, and the fact there's some clearly cut content which the game itself jokes about. But the game being $30 not including sales makes this a minor criticism.

Oh yeah, and f*ck Xbox. Glad to see Microslop's console brand dying.

A very enjoyable twin-stick shooter roguelite. It's fairly simple as the core gameplay is dealing with waves of enemies in a confined arena, but this is made up for in other ways.

The biggest strength of the game is the controls and core mechanics of combat. You essentially have two modes, on foot where you can use your guns and a ball mode where you roll around faster, are affected by slopes and can boost for a burst of speed. If you're going fast enough you'll start dealing contact damage, and contact damage is necessary in order for enemies to drop ammo. There are also various environmental objects you can use like bounce pads, boost pads, fans and tubes that play into your mobility.

It's incredibly satisfying to make good use of your movement, dodging enemy abilities in ball form, springing into on-foot to shoot your guns where possible, and then when opportunities present themselves smashing into enemies with either boost or environmental objects and sending them careening off the map or into each other which deals even more damage. You can also get various abilities and upgrades that play into this, and it all works well together.

The biggest issue with the game is that it simply lacks content. Only 4 zones and 4 bosses, and 4 characters with different base stats and starting loadouts. There are a decent number of guns and upgrades you can unlock, but most of them are pretty basic and do little to change how you play. There is nowhere near the depth in other roguelites like TBoI: Rebirth, Enter the Gungeon, Slay the Spire or even Balatro. Once you beat the game there are higher difficulties you can challenge, but it doesn't change enough to be all that engaging.

Regardless of that lack of content it's still great fun while it lasts and the game is mostly very polished, with colorful appealing visuals, good animations that provide feedback on what's happening and it's well optimised. One of the few games I can run at a consistent 240hz with my PC. With such stiff competition it's a bit hard to recommend at full price, but on a sale it's absolutely worth it.

A nice little puzzle platformer that you can beat in less than half an hour. For a presumably solo developed student project, it's a good first showing. Visuals and sound design are solid, and there are some neat ideas here with swapping between the light and knight forms. The puzzles are pretty basic and they probably could've been expanded on more, but for what it is it's worth a play if you have a bit of spare time.

Very solid Wario Land inspired platformer.

I personally found it a bit easy for my liking, and there isn't much incentive nor does it feel rewarding to chase 100% completion or good times like it did in Pizza Tower. That said it's still very fun, every level is extremely unique, the game has a great art style and humor, and also a killer soundtrack. The game also has great boss fights, with some great set pieces and visuals.

It's also very short, with only a dozen levels. Just because of the length I'd suggest waiting on sale, but if you like platformers this is an easy one to recommend.

GRIME is in my opinion one of the most underrated Metroidvania titles out there. While it may not be quite on par with Hollow Knight or the upcoming Silksong, I actually got much more enjoyment out of it than Ender Lilies: Quietus of the Knights despite that game being much more well known. It isn't flawless, but for the first game by Clover Bite it's an incredible showing.

To start with, the presentation here is excellent. While the visuals can lack a bit of polish at points, it has an overall incredibly striking art direction and morbid, abstract world which sets itself apart. Some areas are downright gorgeous, and while the game isn't quite top-notch as far as visual fidelity it still looks good overall.
The music is also absolutely fantastic, with most of the soundtrack being done by Alex Roe who is known for his excellent Dark Souls remixes. It's absolutely fantastic stuff, we're talking on the same level as the FromSoft titles that inspired him.

On the gameplay side it's also great, blending metroidvania with Dark Souls in many smart ways. The combat always requires you to be on your toes as enemies hit hard and deflecting/absorbing attacks is central to it. You're heavily rewarded for facing the enemies head-on rather than playing it safe, but managing your stamina means you always have to think and can't just spam the dash or be a glass cannon that kills bosses before they can do anything. Said bosses are also excellent, with distinct designs and ways of dealing with just about all of them, ramping up from relatively easy but not pushovers to some very demanding, but fair challenges that are very memorable.

You're also rewarded for good play with Ardor, which is essentially the inverse of how Hollow Knight handles death. Rather than losing currency on death, you lose a resource which acts as a currency multiplier, so the longer you go without dying the more you're rewarded, but you can't get stuck in a loop of dying and being too weak to do anything about it.

In typical Metroidvania fashion you explore the world, unlocking new abilities and finding new equipment to empower yourself as well as gain access to more of the world. Where it really becomes great is that in NG+ you keep everything, not just your level, but also the abilities and items. This makes the game go from relatively linear to incredibly open, with almost the entire world accessible from the very start. What's more is that NG+ doesn't just increase the stats of enemies and bosses, it actually changes how almost all of them behave, giving them new properties or attacks as well as a NG+ exclusive secret boss. NG+ here actually feels like an extension of the base game and proper post-game, rather than an afterthought to make repeat playthroughs a little more interesting.

The story is also excellent, while it can be a bit confusing it's generally well told between various NPC dialogue, item descriptions and environmental storytelling. The setting is incredibly unique and dark, and it's engaging figuring out what exactly is going on in the world and what role the various characters and factions play in it. Without going into spoilers too much it's not just your typical "fallen kingdom, go take down the people responsible and choose to put the final nail in the coffin or keep it alive" type plotline.

The main negative here is the technical side. On launch the game was apparently horribly plagued with performance issues and bugs, and while it's gotten a lot better it's still not perfect. I encountered instances of clipping into terrain, randomly being teleported, and visual bugs. They were rare and didn't sour the experience, but it's clearly not the most polished game. The game also doesn't perform great, I can get a stable 180 FPS at native 1440p in games like Deep Rock Galactic, System Shock Remake, Doom Eternal, etc. at max or nearly max settings, but in this game I can't even hit 100 FPS with a Ryzen 7700X and RX 6800. It's apparently even worse on the Switch, with the game looking much worse and still performing horribly. For a first game it's somewhat excusable, but it's a blemish on an otherwise fantastic game regardless.

Aside from that my only major criticism is Traits & Hunt Points. While it's cool on paper and does allow for a decent amount of customization, they feel less like specializing into a certain playstyle and mostly are just enhancing stats and doing things you were already doing, not really living up to the concept of absorbing your foes and using their abilities. Giving you more damage/lifesteal on successful deflects or pulls, increasing stats, dealing damage to enemies on deflect, etc. The majority are just making you better at things you were already doing while pretending to be ways to change your playstyle. It feels inspired by the Power of Dominance from Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow & Dawn of Sorrow, but isn't executed quite as well as that or even the charms from Hollow Knight. They just aren't unique or distinct enough.

Overall though, GRIME is still a great Metroidvania I'd recommend to anyone who likes metroidvanias, action RPGs, or platformers. It stands out as something unique from a team with a strong vision and understanding of the genres. If I were to give it a score, I'd say 8/10 is about where it lands.

This game has the reputation it does for a reason.

Classes are all distinct and play an important role in the team, the game incentivizes teamwork through its mechanics and the tools you're given, plenty of customization with both cosmetics and your equipment, and pretty good variety of mission types with different biomes and modifiers mixed in along with great procedural generation.

The overall gameplay loop is also just fantastic, mixing mining and exploration with swarms of enemies you'll have to work together to eliminate creating a great risk/reward of splitting up to complete objectives as fast as possible while also needing to be ready for when a swarm happens. Then it ends with needing to make your way to an extraction pod as enemies emerge from all over under a time limit, making every mission end in a climax reminiscent of a Metroid game.

The cherry on top is the devs are fantastic and respect their players. They do their best to listen to feedback, implement fun little things to give the game personality, have made the game more than reasonably priced and there is virtually zero microtransaction bullcrap. There are a few cosmetic packs you can buy if you want to support them, but that's it. 99% of cosmetics are earned by playing the game with no way to pay to speed it up, and the seasonal content becomes part of the regular loot pool once a season ends. Virtually everything is earned.

The game tends to go on sale for around 60% off, so if you aren't convinced to buy it at full price at least get it on sale. You're doing yourself a disservice not at least giving this game a try.