Recent reviews by Deserte

Rating: ★★★☆☆ (3 out of 5 stars)

The First Descendant is an exciting and visually impressive game that provides a lot of fun when you dive into the gameplay. The characters and mechanics are unique, and the general game design offers hours of entertainment.

However, there's one key issue that significantly hinders the enjoyment and progression: the grind and drop chances. This is where the game often feels like an endless frustration, amplified by a poorly balanced RNG (Random Number Generator) system.

The drop chance for certain items, like blueprints and patterns, is listed at 20%, which theoretically means you should expect a drop after around five attempts. However, in practice, the system feels completely arbitrary. You can run 30, 40, or even 50 attempts and still not receive the desired items. This is not only frustrating but also discouraging for players who want to really immerse themselves in the game.

If the game is going to rely on a percentage-based drop system, it should reflect that in reality. Instead of presenting unrealistic numbers, it would be much fairer if the RNG system rewarded the player better after a certain number of failed attempts — maybe through a minimum guaranteed drop. This would not only reduce frustration but also build trust in the system. It’s important to note that drop chances should never exceed 100% for a drop table, as this just creates unnecessary confusion and makes it harder for players to gauge their actual progress.

Positives:

Great characters, exciting missions, and many customization options.
A wide variety of challenges and strategic decisions that keep the game interesting.
Negatives:

The grind feels unnecessarily long and unreasonable because the drop chance doesn’t align with the actual experience.
The RNG system leads to a frustrating player experience, as it often feels like progress and rewards are purely random.
Drop chances should never exceed 100% for a drop table, as this creates confusion and doesn’t contribute to a fair or rewarding progression system.

Final Verdict: The First Descendant has a lot of potential and is a great game overall, but the RNG and grind mechanics are far from providing a fair and satisfying player experience right now. I hope the developers will address the balance issues in the future to make the game more accessible and less frustrating for all players. Until then, it’s hard to recommend the game without reservations, especially for those who don’t have the patience for arbitrary RNG.

Review Update 30.12.2024

Path of Exile 2 has entered Early Access with high expectations, but unfortunately, its current state leaves much to be desired. While the game retains much of the complexity and depth that fans loved in its predecessor, it also introduces frustrating mechanics that detract from the overall experience.

One of the most contentious new features is the collision system. In theory, it adds a layer of realism and strategy to the gameplay, but in practice, it feels entirely misplaced in a fast-paced Hack'N'Slay game. The system makes navigating through mobs unnecessarily cumbersome, often turning tense situations into outright frustration. This is compounded by a poorly optimized movement system that feels clunky and unresponsive.

Input lag is a significant issue, with the game sometimes failing to register keystrokes, leaving your character stuck as if glued to the ground. Rather than feeling fluid and dynamic, the character movement is sluggish, almost as if the protagonist is wading through molasses. These issues take away from the satisfaction of overcoming challenging encounters, replacing the thrill of difficulty with exasperation at technical shortcomings.

Boss fights are another glaring issue. They are ridiculously and poorly designed, relying on damage sponges that spawn overwhelming amounts of minions. This design choice turns fights into tedious endurance tests rather than engaging challenges. The game appears to be attempting a Souls-like approach to boss mechanics but fails miserably. A boss spamming abilities incessantly doesn't add meaningful difficulty—it simply highlights a lack of innovation and the absence of thoughtfully crafted mechanics to make encounters enjoyable rather than frustrating. Adding insult to injury, loot drops often cater to specs you’re not even playing. The irony of grinding as your chosen class only to be rewarded with gear you can't use makes the experience even more disheartening.

To top it off, the game runs poorly on hardware like the ROG Ally, even with well-optimized settings and stable 70 FPS. Despite the decent frame rate, the game feels horrendously sluggish, further detracting from any potential enjoyment.

If I were to offer feedback to the developers, my top recommendation would be to remove the collision system altogether. A Hack'N'Slay game thrives on fluidity and responsiveness, and right now, Path of Exile 2 struggles in both departments. Making the character movement snappier and more intuitive would be a huge step in the right direction. Additionally, boss fights need a complete overhaul to include engaging and well-thought-out mechanics that focus on strategy and fun rather than spamming and frustration.

At its current price point—over $30—Path of Exile 2 is difficult to recommend. While it shows promise and may eventually evolve into a worthy successor to the original, its early access state is marred by design choices that hinder its core gameplay loop. Unless these issues are addressed, players are likely better off waiting for improvements or considering other options in the genre.

Review: Once Human (Updated 10th Dec. 2024)


Positive Points:

Building System: The building mechanics remain a highlight. They are well-designed and form a solid foundation for future expansions.

Season and Change System: The seasonal changes add depth to the game world, though the seasons themselves feel a bit too short.

Developer Improvements: On a positive note, a few of my previous suggestions have made it into the game, and some issues have been addressed. This is a step in the right direction and shows that the developers are willing to listen—at least to some degree. However, this progress is not enough to counterbalance the game's deeper flaws.

Negative Aspects (Not Deal-Breakers):

Repetitive Gameplay: The gameplay still feels like a rinse-and-repeat cycle. Manibus, for example, drags on for weeks when it could easily be wrapped up within a week of regular playtime. The content is lackluster, and once you hit a new phase, you’re often left waiting 7–10+ days for the next stage. While this might work for some, it’s not enough to keep many players engaged.

Community: The in-game community remains relatively solid, but trolls and leechers occasionally disrupt the experience, as expected in any online game.

Critical Negative Aspects:

Server Performance: The server performance continues to decline. Despite removing numerous objects from certain locations to improve playability, the game still struggles significantly. This measure feels more like a band-aid solution than a real fix, and unfortunately, it hasn’t made much of a difference.

Content Development Focus: While the developers claim to focus on fixing bugs, their primary energy seems directed at monetization. The loot crates they release for skins, costing upwards of €100, are absurd, especially for a game with this many technical issues. It’s frustrating to see such a high emphasis on revenue generation when the game itself feels more like a patchwork car barely holding together.

Development Priorities: The lack of meaningful content updates and continued focus on cash grabs detracts from the overall experience. Players are left waiting for updates that don’t provide substantial engagement or innovation. Instead, the same cycle of monetization takes precedence over actual improvements to gameplay and performance.

NPC Issues and Bugs: While a few bugs have been fixed, fundamental issues like NPC glitches, ghost hits from invisible enemies, and unreliable AI remain prevalent. These issues have persisted for far too long and severely impact gameplay immersion.

Severe Concern: Support System

Customer Support: The support system has not improved. Payment-related issues still go unanswered, and generic, copy-pasted responses remain the norm for most queries. This chaotic and unprofessional approach is a stark reminder of how disconnected the developers seem from their player base.
Final Verdict:

Despite some minor improvements, Once Human is still not worth your time or money in its current state. Server performance remains abysmal, content is stale and repetitive, and the blatant prioritization of cash grabs over meaningful development is disheartening. Unless the developers make drastic changes to their approach—focusing on the game itself rather than exploiting their players—I cannot recommend this game.

For now, my verdict remains a strong thumbs down.

ist nur stoned geil

An interesting indie title that comes with several features of different games like FTL etc. I must be honest I didn’t expect too much of a 27,99 Euro title, but well I learned it the hard way that you can have more fun in such an indie title then in other full price triple A titles!

I invested 28 hours in Everspace till I finished it by playing through the entire small Storyline, unlocking all traits on the available ships (Interceptor, Scout and Gunboat), sadly I couldn’t unlock all Perks since I always choose the wrong path and didn’t ran into any ancient ruins at the end… Well none the less I must say I am quite impressed by what Everspace is offering here for 27,99 and I can totally recommend it for its price if you like Rogue-like Action Space games, you get so much for the low price that it is already impressive, I didn’t even expect it but VR support is for sure something I wouldn’t expect in such a budget title.

But now to the game itself, at the beginning you are pretty much “Cannon fodder” if you start of on the highest possible difficulty, there are so many different scenarios possible that it is almost a ensured that you will die quite often at the beginning, since you don’t have the scanner skills that tell you what is awaiting you within the next system, so you will not know if there is like almost 0 view range, a wormhole, a lightning storm or even a big okkar frigate.

All in all the replay ability of Everspace is there and I enjoy the game quite a lot with all the achievements and the challenges they implemented those are nice to have especially the challenges are a neat feature too since they offer you a second way of earning some credits to skill up your ships.

One more thing is the crafting system which is hold simple but offers a huge variety of items to enhance your ships system to get the maximum out of your flown vessel, keep in mind at the beginning you will need to loot blueprints from enemy ships or containers, ensure that you loot them.

The atmosphere in Everspace is a blast in my opinion due to all the natural hazards that can occur and the different versions of space that you travel too…. Dogfights in Asteroid belts with the risk of boosting your ship into the next Asteroid?!?!? Well depending on the difficulty, you choose you will either instantly blow up or you take massive dmg to almost no damage on easy.

Finally, if you decide to give this game a try don’t forget to spend all your beloved credits between your runs or you will lose them! Also, don’t expect a MP for this game, it would for sure be a nice thing to have but it was not developed to be a MP title, so fasten your seat belts and launch your ship for a journey through Everspace.

Thank you again to ROCKFISH Games for the Review Copy I do appreciate it 😊 and keep up the great work. I’m looking forward to more content for Everspace.

I am quite unhappy with the way the game goes!

In my oppinion this game is for sure no release title more like a E.A. ...

I played the Original The Hunter from hour zero and this here is not even slighty what I have expeced, starting a MP Session with some friends to explore and Unlock locations ain't working and it seems like it is not even planned to implement a function that everyone in a session is unlocking locations etc. when you visit them the first time. Since only the host can interact with objects.

Also to no focus on this and the bugs is a shame...

I wish I could still refund it after that time of evaluation, but sadly steam just offer 2 hrs refund time.

I for my case can just say I will not throw money in avalaches Studio to do their QA's work!

If you are looking for some different survival experience, this game is definitely a good choice. First of all before I talk deeper about the game itself I need to say that this is not a shooter or some zombie survival game, if you think it was something like that it is for sure not the game that you should get.

Before we start I need to say that you should be aware of that this game can be really time intense, since you will focus on doing progress. But now let’s talk about the game, the game you get your chance to control 2 – 4 (5?) Civilian-Survivors in a city under siege with the only goal to survive till its end.

The game Started and the first thing you will notice it is a kind of Slider- / Point & Click Game which makes the game even more interesting. For now we just have one BIG goal! The goal to survive the siege with all our Survivors, no matter on what way you want to go through the game, it is open to you! BUT keep in mind all your actions will take effect on the mood of your Survivors.

You can try to beat the game as a brutal badass assassin, which is killing all civilians, raiders, deserters or soldiers, in order to get materials, medication and food back home to improve the surviving chance for your community. Also rejecting, to help other survivors that randomly appear in front of your base and asking you for help.

Or just like a trader, which is scavenging empty buildings in order to get base materials back to base and later trading them off for better goods like medications and food. Also supporting other survivors is playing a big role for you, since this is increasing the mood within your community.

There are plenty of other ways too but it would be too hard to describe them in this small space ;).

So as you see I talked about Mood in the last part. Yes, right the mood one of the most important things in TWoM, every decision you make will either increase or rapidly decrease the mood of your fellows.

Also you have to take care of hunger, illnesses, injuries or sleep, if you don’t pay attention to those people, you will lose them due starvation, injuries, heavy diseases or even suicides.

It is a very complex game and again every decision you make, every action you take will affect your gameplay at the end. It could mess up the game and you will not even make it past day 12.

I will not provide any in game tips in my review, only one keep it warm in your building or you return back to your base and you have survivors on a stick ;) during winter.

Personal Rating: 9.0

Sounds/Music: 9.5 (The music is matching the ambient, which is matching this kind of survival game. It is traumatizing)

Gameplay: 8.5 (The controls are easy to manage and also the Movement controls are working as intended and other actions)

Storyline: 9.0 (At some point people will say WTF??? Storyline? Yes, if you check every Survivors BIO it will tell you a little story about them, even so this Game is showing of what is ongoing during a siege and it is indirect telling you a lot about it how it is to survive etc. even if it is just a Game at the End)

Graphic: N/A (The graphic is amazing for this kind of game and it is matching to the music and the situation)

Thanks for reading this review, if you find any errors or typos keep them :P