Recent reviews by vanburman

It's rare to write a review knowing it's one of the best RPG's ever.

Yeah, that'll do - 95/100

Don't get me wrong, it is NOT perfect. But by goodness it has some soul, it's beautiful to look at and is a tonne of fun.

Debates on whether it is a Soulslike or Soulslite. Irrelevant really, it has some difficulty, and if you're not into those types of games you will have to have some perseverance. But it is all possible, either with time and setup or skill.

Finished the game with minimal grinding, defeated all optional bosses (barring 2) and at level 96 after about 55 hours. A good couple of them were walking around admiring the scenery, It does however, have some BIG difficulty spikes, that do not set the tone for the game, they are there to teach you the game, which as the first one comes in Chapter 1 can be really frustrating after you paid full price and have gone past the 2 hour mark. For me that same boss (WCN) was the most difficult and took me the most attempts in the entire game. It's always possible though, lots of good guides online and don't be afraid to use them, BMW is really hands off!

I always love to see mythos depicted in video games and this is right on the money for Journey to the West.

In my personal opinion it's close to and (for the mainstream) should have been the 2024 GOTY. And for me personally it is a 9/10. But it will crush your PC at higher settings. Luckily it still looks great on a 1080ti at Medium with FSR. (4k scaled to 1080p)

Okay so just a quick review and to be TLDR; Like Warband? if yes then get it. Sure it's not finished and there are some noticable placeholders. But remember that feeling of first getting your bow in campagin mode and firing off way into the distance only to luckily score some kind of medievil Robin Hood trickshot ? Well relive that all again my friend. And enjoy!

Blazing Fists

For now all I shall say is... I like it. Plus Guan Yu kicks a$$ just as he should !

Played as mercia only thus far, and up to over 20 hours worth of game play. Game is vast and to complete fully needs up to 250 turns for domination.
Aesthetically was concerned about the unit cards and the style seen before the release, However, everything comes together well and is coherent.

Change things up, lets talk about what the game does badly first off.
Lack of Forced March and Ambush stances
No garrisons for non major settlements, which can technically mean an army with only one unit can take any of your minor settlements and either sack them or occupy.
STILL - lack of loose formation for missile units, yet the axemen have it???
Lack of a mercenary pool. but this is due to being able to recruit from a global pool, pay off for that is them joining at 25% ish strength.
Skill trees for generals and governors are lacking in complexity, feels quite bare-bones.

Moving on to the positives.

Battles feel more impact and has a less arcadey feel than total war Attila. - for example horses rearing up if they charge head on into spears/ shields.
The politics and intrigue feels more immersive than previous versions, diplomacy also feels as though it has a more substantial impact on gameplay.
Siege Battles - back to how they should be even without Ladders. Really nice settlement maps with multiple points of attack and a large emphasis on geographical barriers, such as moats and hills.
Different play styles for the 5 distinct faction types, for example the Kingdoms of England focus on the dividing of estates amongst the nobles and the recruitment of peasants to the army, Think Bretonnia from warhammer.
More ways to win than total domination, you can raise your fame as a new mechanic to win so opens up different ways to play through.

In conclusion, I was very sceptical going in, with fairly low expectations from this 'Saga' series. However I have been pleasantly surprised with the quality and features of the game, lets hope the rest of this follow this trend and improve even further. I guess the main conclusion is that I feel as though we have gone forward with this TW game. Most people will say, yes but we were already 5 steps back, and while that may be true in some regards the fact that we are seeing progress is a big boost especially as 3 kingdoms is out later in the year. I give the game a solid 8/10 could have easily been a 9 but since I wrote down the negatives I can no longer give it that as there is just too much that has been omitted.

Youtube Review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U95h8Z04R18

Update:
'Life is about beginings and not endings', and this particular peice of story work has me enamoured. It may seem totally inpromrehncible but some moments have litterally left me in awe, and for good reason.

There are a good amount of plot holes and sequences that do not marry up, also some grammatical and spelling errors, though let's remember there were plenty in FF7. One of these such examples is to do with the armoured princess (I guess minor spoliers here) Claires father makes it clear early on that she is rarely seen and that she is kept away from the public, yet claire has substantial meetings with her and she seems to have full reign of the city without the town guard going absolutley mad that she has departed.

The clever and sutble reference and nods to other RPG's are most welcome and they are not overdone either, such as this one in relation to FF7.

While I have yet to firmninatley comment on it, the obvious plus point is the soundtrack! absolutely sublime and as used by RPG's of yonder years this has a massive impact in the storytelling, it's up there with some of the best ever.

Video Review: https://youtu.be/f8LJ98kdtpo

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Perhaps it's abit early to give a review on a game where I'm not even past the intro.

But my very early opinion of this is very high. A beautifully put together game, it's obvious alot of time and effort has gone into making this as polished as it seems thus far.

Naturally it's a very slow paced, narritive driven game and this should be at the fore of your mind when going into the game.

The story aspects soo far are interesting and have me wanting to learn more about the world and the chararcters.

So I'll leave this here for now and update when appropriate. If you want to see it running and how it looks in-game check out my video below.

Youtube: https://youtu.be/NqjfVPVxBIU

Void monsters review for steam

Early Impressions here, expect some modification. And please see my video impressions below.

First of all, there is metric tonne of content here, I'm sure going on 100 hours worth of gameplay.
Mixes both the economical side of say a Stardew Valley, and the monster trainer aspects of a Digimon or Poke'mon game.
The great thing so far is that neither feel watered down to compensate the other. You can tell that alot of time and devotion has gone into this, always something to do, and what that is, is up to you.

It's worth of a reccomendation on that alone. However, it is not without it's flaws. It can be very micromanagement heavy at times, which to be honest is not as bad as it could be,

More than that though, the game seems to betray it's own logic at times and doesn't always makes sense in it's own story, which for the most part has been lacking. Once again I am early in so we shall see where this takes us. And is the aspect most likely change upon a full review.

Combat is turn based as you would expect, a good amount of variety soo far. I am very happy with this thus far, if it wasn't for the camera sway, it'd be almost perfect.

I don't usually like scores for games (even though I do them anyway) but I was very surprised by this and even though, story is a big part of any RPG for me I am still very much inclined at this time to give a good score.

8/10 - A brilliant example of what an RPG Maker game can be.

To the Devs- Good job! I look forward to seeing more from you following this!.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iMnDSqjge8

Not usually a fan of 4x games [Or even 5x ;)]
But the game is quirky enough and intersting enough to capture my interest.
A lovely job done by BlueWizard. Sometimes it's bad to be good!
A solid 7/10 for me, your milage may vairy.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSC1UtdJxgk&feature=youtu.be

If you're reading the reviews wondering if you should try it, then I'm confident you will.