Recent reviews by nix

The first paradox grand strat in a long time to feel complete on launch day.

I love this game, I love everything Blendo has made. This is somewhere between an Immersive Sim and an action Puzzle game. The closest comparison I could make, strangely, is the Hitman series. If the Hitman series took place in the 80s' idea of what a cyberpunk future might look like. I went for all the achievements and it took me about 10 hours. I'm now going back to 3 star on the maps (doing hidden objectives, basically). Strong recommend.

The gameplay was intriguing to me at first but quickly repetitive. The story was trite, I'm quite tired of stories about men being motivated by the victimization of women.

While I've gotta give the team credit for really great visuals, the story itself was really disappointing to me.

Spoilers ahead: The story hinges, partly, on the victimization of the one female crew member. She's easily the least fleshed out character, existing pretty much entirely as a victim/subject of the men's behavior. This was really off-putting to me.

Just. So. Cozy.

This is my GOTY for 2024, and probably one of my top games period.

Beautiful game, I enjoyed my time quite a bit with it. It has wonderful thoughts to share about the nature of memory, time periods, travelling, and more. This game was one of several things that pushed me back towards journaling more.

A couple things I loved: The reflective, slow pieces. The beauty of the world you inhabit. The depth of the lore. The characters.

A couple things that bothered me a little bit: Maybe this is just me, but I reached a point about halfway through where I was just slapping things on my journal. I also felt a little sad when I took a picture of something that seemed neat to me but didn't get a quote, like I was looking at the "wrong" things. Finally, there's two endings, and without spoiling it too much, I wish they diverged more.

Ultimately, I have a hard time suggesting this game at full price just because it's not that long. It is beautiful tho, so maybe that's just a matter of how much you value a beautiful 6 hour experience. At the very least, wishlist it and get it on sale.

It's fun, it's informative, it's free, and it's about important stuff. It's one of the few games that helps me not only feel hope, but also feel motivated. Everyone should at least play a couple rounds.

This game is mindless fun and a really smooth player experience. If you want to beat up some dudes, be a bad ass with a heart of gold, and do some silly side things, you'll have a good time.

The story is cheesy and somewhat bland, but serviceable. I played on medium and found most fights to just be "mash the combo that works on this boss" but there were a few bosses where I found myself switching styles and combos and enjoying it.

The game really shines in player experience polish. There's a ton of side content. All the info about all of it is very well conveyed. And you can do ALL of it on your save after beating the main game, so you don't have to choose between hours of completionism and continuing the story. To me that made it much easier to just enjoy the game.

tl;dr I loved loved loved Life is Strange. Tell Me Why isn't as good as LiS. But it's still very good, and if you liked LiS you'll like this.

Overall, beautiful game with an engaging story. The end is satisfying, although a few side details get left unresolved. The final choice is really powerful. The main characters are relatable and their relationship is really enjoyable to experience. I will probably go back and play this again in a couple months.

My only real complaint is that sometimes I'd fumble a bit with interacting with things, by being at the wrong angle or too close for the prompt to show up. It's minor, but would be nice if the controls were just a bit more permissive.