Recent reviews by Esseth

I really liked the first one, and this sequel did everything a great sequel should. Keep the spirit and all the core mechanics that made the original great, but expand, develop and basically more of all the good things.

Where the fine line comes into it, is when you expand and grow the story/mechanics and world, do you lose the things that made the original what it was. This one, I was very pleased to say didn't lose those things.

Great little gem of a modern sci-fi game.

Ultimate verdict remains: Should have been called VtM: *Insert other word here* and you would have the best VtM game since Bloodlines, but it's not Bloodlines 2. Although I think Night Road and Parliment of Knives were also excellent, but not the type of game most people play.

It looks great, both map design and visuals, great atmopshere and tone, good soundtrack (but lacking the awesome licensed music in clubs from the OG), good and interesting story and a fresh take on a VtM story. All those things are areas that The Chinese Room excels at if you're familiar with their other titles.

Where they are not as good, and I knew this going in so my expectations were fairly in-line, is the actual RPG mechanics of VtM. No weapon skills, no skill checks (hacking/lockpicking/investigation), no conversation skills with highly linear levels and the few side quests lack much of interest.

Combat and movement sit in the middle of a case of when they feel good, they can feel amazing but when they don't it feels like crap.

But hey, I remember Bloodlines when it released and at least I could play and finish this one :D

A solid game with pros and cons, similar to Inquisition.
For TLDR: Solid game, if you liked Inquisition you will probably have a good time, but very much an Action -RPG instead of an Action- RPG. So enjoyment when it comes to combat and depth may vary.

The environmental and map designs are legit some of the best the series has had and are visually stunning. The amour/outfits were more hit and miss for me, but that's a constant of the series and does come down to personal taste.

The combat is not my jam at all, as it's a full on action game with minimal actual RPG elements and as someone that prefers slower or turnbased RPG's this was not my cup of tea, granted it felt good as an action game but some fights in the early/mid game were too much for me. Became less of an issue once my build/skills and gear reached a certain level and then felt OP which was fun.

I didn't have as many issues with the writing or characters as others seemed to, but I had only recently played Inquisition and for me it felt about the same as that. I liked most of the characters, and while a lot of their personal quests seemed like random disconnected stories that could have been their own thing entirely, but maybe that was the intent.

Certain party member choices towards the endgame don't work as well in this game as they do in other similar games due to this being more of a role based RPG (Tank/Healer-Caster/Rogue-Ranger) so losing any of those could have a major impact on your build/playstyle/party composition.

This was my most played Early Access game at around 300 hours, and I'm approaching a similar number since 1.0 released. I don't really play early access games, so that alone should indicate how good this game can be.

For me, this is the best factory building game on the market. I've enjoyed others like DSP and Shapez and often put a decent number of hours into them (nothing close to Satisfactory), while I've tried multiple times to get into Factorio but it's never clicked.

There is something about the crafted world and first person setting that makes this one work far better for me, when you build something massive, it really is massive and you can see it. While the scale of something like DSP is obviously larger, I can't help but feel the relative scale is bigger with Satisfactory.

The amount of options to tailor the game to suit your own playstyle is huge and the community managers and how they worked with the community to make the game what it is today is incredible. They changed a lot over time, while keeping true to the vision they had for the game.

On that, their open and honest approach with the community during the fairly long development cycle is my gold standard for the industry in terms of Early Access and game development in general.

So first thing I have to do is give huge credit to the voice actors, for a short narrative game like this if the voice performances are weak the whole thing falls apart. But the entire voice cast hits it out of the park, especially the lead trio of Philip Sacramento, Amanda Silvera and Keaton Talmadge. First time I've heard any of their work but their names will be on my radar in future.

The term "Immersive" gets thrown around, but it really fits the bill for this game. The sound design from top to bottom, the visuals and atmosphere are 10/10 and if Altered Carbon/Blade Runner vibes are your jam and you enjoy taking your time with games you should enjoy this.

In terms of gameplay/puzzles it's fairly light more in line with something like Life is Strange in the Altered Carbon universe. I would have loved a "disable all hints/auto item equips" option as some people have mentioned it is a little too eager to remind you what tool to use in any circumstance even though there is only a few options.

The other thing that some might say is a bad thing, but for me is a huge positive in this era of live service games that go on forever, is the game is short. I took my time with it and it was around 7 hours, which to be clear is a huge positive in my book because I can play the game, enjoy the journey and then consider it finished.

Won't be for everyone, but for those that enjoy those cyberpunk aesthetic and neon noir vibes should be in for good time.

Loved BG3 but wanted something that felt more inline with the crpg's like BG2/Icewind Dale era, more complexity, difficulty or straight up brutal punishment? well this is the game for you. I still have a few of the DLC's to buy, but whenever I do it leads to another 200 hour long playthough. Now some people will see that and go "Eww", and that's ok but for some people it's perfect.

The expansive class system and multiple Mythic paths, honestly give it so much more depth and complexity than even the universally praised BG3 (which I also loved and 100% completed).

The custom difficulty is awesome, suck at one part of the game but are really good at the another part, great you can fully tune the difficulty to exactly what you enjoy.

Their ongoing support as well including updates/fixes and additions even without the DLC's is great.
Yes Owlcat games are normally pretty buggy on release, but that's normally due to their complexity with a billion different combinations, and while some are game breaking that normally get fixed pretty quick, others are just annoying or ignorable but there is also a great modding community that has your back if there is something annoying that you want to change.

Maybe it's just me, but if I don't like a game enough to give it a negative review I don't play it for 50-100 hours+ like some of these reviews.

For me, if a game is bad I barely give it more than a few hours.
I spent 80-90 hours in Starfield and I enjoyed it enough that I did that. Granted maybe people with negative reviews were all over the hype train, but I ignore most pre-release hype and go in giving it a blank slate.

Starfield for me, was the exact game I expected it to be. Big, open, lots to do, terrible main story, clunky UI, fun ship/base building that I spent most of my time with, with side quests and faction quest lines being way more interesting and fun than the main story.

Those were my expectations, and that's kinda what it was.
The big thing for me compared to other big RPG's was always it felt like I was telling my character's story, instead of the story the devs made to be followed.

As someone that took multiple attempts to get into Dark Souls 3, and even then only got up to Pontiff before calling it quits, I think this will still by my game of the year 2022. Even though I suck at it, I still really enjoy every moment of it (minus the finger spiders). Also now the modding scene (like all From games) is amazing, currently experimenting with randomizer.

Phenomenal Game, tone and worldbuilding backed up by some of the best combat in gaming.

Super chill, zen, relaxing game, no timelimit puzzle game.
Great design, and easy to pick up and yet lots to learn if you want to push for the high ranks.

Absolutely great value for such a chill little game that you can just keep coming back to.

Took me multiple failed play attempts as I slowly got the hang of it but each game learning something new and consistently return to the game every so often after I grab a random DLC while its on sale.

Reminds me of a realtime Master of Orion 2 in its current state and I can't get enough of playing as murderbots.