Quick Review - The Witcher 2

A Quick Review of...

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings

CD Projekt Red

REDengine

Windows, OS X, XBOX 360

Action, RPG, Hack-n-slash

May 17, 2011

Preamble

So I picked up The Witcher on GOG.com in early 2011 as a result of seeing some early gameplay footage of The Witcher 2, and being blown away from what I saw. With The Witcher, I was greeted with an unexpectedly immersive and adult oriented RPG with its main drawback being mediocre combat mechanics. But it hooked me. The story, characters, setting; all of it sucked me in and made me care about the world.

Despite my satisfaction with The Witcher, I didn't get around to playing the sequel until now. It was one of those games that sat in the backlog, and every time I thought about playing it, I came up with some excuse to justify not starting quite yet. I'm quite disappointed with myself for putting it off this long, but better late than never, right?

With recent news of the development of The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt (which is going to be open-world!!) and CD Projekt Red's new IP Cyberpunk 2077, my desire to jump back into the world of Temeria was rekindled. I couldn't be happier that I did, as this is easily the best game that I've played so far this year.

The Quick

Play the role of Geralt of Rivia, a famous witcher (essentially a mutant bounty hunter that hunts monsters) playing bodyguard for King Foltest, when all hell breaks lose. The king is assassinated pretty much right under your nose (not really a spoiler as it happens almost immediately) and you are the prime suspect. Your job is to find who's responsible and clear your name. Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg, the story branches in many different directions, presenting you with plenty of decisions to make and monsters to fight, resulting in an exceptional RPG experience.

The Good

• Combat. Clearly a massive improvement to the pseudo-QTE (quick time event) combat of The Witcher. The combat is technical, challenging, and fun to engage in. Timing is critical in stringing together combos with your strong attacks, weak attacks, and magic and even more essential in dodging and parrying.
  
  
• Deep story made possible by great writing. Not only is the overarching main story rich with a variety of character arcs to encounter and decisions to make, there’s a plethora of content to explore on the side that illuminates the world and characters in a variety of ways. Outside of a couple of MMO-like collection quests, the side quest content is quite robust and punctuated by great story lines that tie back into the main plot. 
  
• Replay value. Depending on what choices you make during Chapter 1 of the game, you will see one of two completely different versions of Chapter 2. Different village to explore, different characters, and different quests. Couple that with the generous amount of story changing side quests throughout the game and you've got yourself a sizable number of possible outcomes. Few games really do this well so I have to give props to CD Projekt Red for clearly putting an emphasis on player choice and individuality in this game. As an RPG enthusiast, I LOVE to see stuff like this.
  
• Graphics. The visuals in this game are out of this world. Perfect lighting, vibrant colors, wonderfully detailed character models and succinct, smooth animations to go along with them. This game came out almost 2 years ago now, and it still stands out as one of the most visually stunning games to date, in my opinion. Kudos to CD Projeckt on their RED Engine, it is downright spectacular.
  
  
  

  

  Just to put things in perspective, here's a screenshot from The Witcher.

  
  

  

  Still shots really don't do this game justice, but you get the idea.

  
  
• Sound. So many great things about the sound in this game. The music is spot on. It fits in the setting perfectly, and helps a great deal in immersing you in the culture of your environment and surroundings. The ambient sounds you encounter throughout the towns and out in the wilderness are just as engrossing as the music. Then there's the voice acting. From the little kids playing in the thoroughfare to the oftentimes antagonizing banter of villagers to the intimate conversations you have with your significant others, everything sounds natural and great.

The Bad

• Character customization. While there’s a ton of skills to pick from for customizing your build and a good deal of decision making to shape Geralt into someone unique to your role playing tastes, you are largely stuck with Geralt... as Geralt. While this wasn’t a big deal for me, as I think Geralt is a badass character, I could see people wanting some more wiggle room with customizing their character.
  
  
• Region sizes. While there is a ton of quest and story content in this game, the environments are somewhat limited in size. You will spend a lot of time running around the same villages and covering a lot of the same ground throughout the chapters. This was a complaint I had about The Witcher as well, and while they've improved the size of the regions, I was hoping they'd open things up a bit more.
  
  
• Reverse difficulty curve. The game is top heavy in terms of difficulty. It will absolutely kick your ass initially, especially as you're trying to figure out the combat mechanics. But as you progress through the game and level up, things just get much easier, to the point that by the end of the game you are downright dominating anything that crosses your path.

The Verdict

Despite its minor flaws, The Witcher 2 will go down as one of my favorite RPGs of this generation, hands down. If you fancy yourself an RPG enthusiast, even in a minor respect, get this game immediately. To put a cherry on top of this great experience, CD Projekt Red has to be one of the most respectable game developers I've come across. They deliver great games, release gigantic content patches for free, and distribute their games without DRM. If nothing else, pick this up just to support the efforts of this great company.

The Extras

Unfortunately, I forgot to record any video (or really take any screenshots) while I was playing this game, and since the review, I had to clear it off the hard drive to make some room. Therefore I can't show you any authentic Thomp gameplay today, but I will provide a couple videos.

This was a new introduction video added for the Enhanced Edition. It is amazing.

This is a short environment walkthrough with one of the developers. It gives you a good idea of what the game looks like.

Quick Review - Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

Game Name:    Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

Developer:    Capcom

Platform:     Nintendo DS

Genre: Adventure, Visual Novel

Release Date: October 11, 2001

Preamble

I’ll admit, I missed this when it came out back in 2001, and for some reason, despite hearing and reading great things, I let the entire series go by the wayside. But, with the recent adventure game kick that I’ve been on and the influx of travel arrangements that I have this month, a good friend of mine recommended that I give this game a go. After considering how much I would love being as cool as Ben Stone, even for a few hours, I quickly dusted off my DS to embark on my journey through the courtroom as Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney!

Ben Stone (Michael Moriarty)
Executive Assistance to the District Attorney
Law & Order - 1990-1994

Description

Play as Phoenix Wright, a rookie defense attorney learning the ropes of criminal investigation and cutthroat courtroom trials. The game is presented in an interactive-novel/point-and-click adventure game style. A sizable part of the game consists of investigations where you navigate around various locations, finding evidence and speaking with witnesses, building your case to bring to the courtroom. The rest of the game takes place in the courtroom itself, where you listen to witness testimonies and then proceed to cross-examine them, presenting evidence to contradict their claims when you can.

The Good

• The courtroom! Why aren’t there more games that take place in the courtroom?! I’ve always been a fan of Law & Order, Grisham novels, and most courtroom movies, so this setting was music to my ears.
• Characters. You come across a wide range of characters throughout the cases you solve, all of which have their own absurd personality quirk and equally ridiculous character sprite animation. The blatant over-the-topness of the characters ends up being pretty hilarious in most cases.
  
  
  

  

  
  
• Adrenaline! When you present that key piece of evidence and make the dramatic Objection! to seal up the case, the music kicks in and it is downright intense! The game does a great job at building up the case and making you really feel that tipping point of solving the mystery.
  
  
  

  

  
  
• There’s really a lot of game here. After the initial intro to the courtroom case, the mysteries you investigate and consequent trials are quite lengthy. With the initial four cases (since then they’ve added an additional case as well), there’s easily 15+ hours of gameplay.

The Bad

• Minimal gameplay. The game is very much an interactive novel. It is very puzzly in that you have to find evidence and use some basic deductive skills to present them in court, but it stays pretty basic throughout the game.
• Ambiguity. It wasn’t as noticeable as in L.A. Noire, but some of the pieces of evidence you end up using to prove certain points are a bit of a stretch. It’s not supposed to be realistic, I know that, but even in the context of the game, there are some questionable leaps of logic.

The Verdict

I’m really nitpicking with the bad notes I have about this game. The game is great, and if you enjoy feeling like a detective, and better yet, a lawyer, you will get a kick out of this game. I’d recommend this to anyone with a DS!

Quick Review - Euro Truck Simulator 2

Game Name:    Euro Truck Simulator 2

Developer:    SCS Software
      Engine:              OpenGL/DirectX 9

Platform:     Windows

Genre: Simulation

Release Date: October 19, 2012

The Quick

Preamble:
This is a fairly cursory review as I only put about 8 hours into this game. I’ve recently become more enticed by simulators, but still have a hard time sinking a whole lot of time into them, as there are so many good games out there that I want to play.

Short description:
Probably not hard to guess, but what you do the most in this game is drive trucks around Europe. More specifically, you run a trucking company where you, and the drivers you hire, drive to various cities, pick up trailers, and deliver them.

The Good:

• RPG stuff! Yes! You read that correctly! You actually gain experience for every delivery you take, and for each level-up, you get a point to spend in the tech trees. These have skills like “Train in Certificate X so you can deliver explosives” (explosive deliveries give you more money), etc. This is great for folks like me that live for those RPG elements.
• Music! The game conveniently allows you to play any music from your computer and also provides you with hundreds of real European radio stations that are streamable from within the game.
• Beautiful European landscapes. For me, this game is very much a source of relaxation. Being able to cruise along to your favorite tunes and gawk at the European countryside is surprisingly soothing.
• Nice mix of casual, relaxing gameplay with subtle challenging moments. While the game is incredibly relaxing, it’s not without it’s challenges. Backing trailers into their delivery spaces can be downright infuriating, but it makes it all the more satisfying when you get that perfect “back-in”.

The Bad:

• Hardcoreness. While this element didn’t bother me too much, I’m not sure how people who are diehard simulation fans will feel about the robustness of the simulation itself. Again, it felt good to me, but it didn’t feel nearly as complex as other simulations that I’ve played.
• Controls. I tried the 360 controller, and it felt really strange, I could not get used to it. I ended up opting for the WASD/Mouse control scheme, which feels surprisingly good for how terrible it normally is in driving games, but it’s obvious the best setup for this game would be with wheel controls.
• Casualness. This is also a good thing, but if you’re not looking for a casual/relaxation game, you’ll likely want to look elsewhere.

All in all, should you play this?

• This game sounded more like a joke than a real game to me initially, but after giving it an honest go, I have to say, it was leaps and bounds better than how I thought it would be. I can’t speak for hardcore simulation enthusiasts, but for someone who is a burgeoning sim fan, and loves RPGs, it’s worth a pick up if you see a good deal (see below).

What would you spend on this?

• I wouldn’t throw down the list price of $40 for this game, it’s interesting, and fairly amusing, but not worth that price tag.
• I paid $10 and feel completely satisfied with my purchase. I think I would have paid up to $20 and still felt pretty good. Anything above that is too much, in my opinion.

Here's a nice little delivery that takes you across Switzerland...

The Review - Hawken (Open Beta)

Game Name:    Hawken (Open Beta)

Developer:    Adhesive Games
      Engine:              Unreal Engine 3

Platform:     Windows

Genre: FPS, Free to Play

Release Date: December 12, 2012 (Open Beta)

The Quick

Short description: Open beta, free-to-play, multiplayer mech based FPS set in a dystopian human-colonized world that has been heavily industrialized. Four game types: FFA, Team Deathmatch, Assault, and Siege (beta).

The Good:

• Graphics and general aesthetic are a beautiful sight to behold.
• No automatic HP regen! You have to strategically use your ‘repair’ ability in order to last more than a fight or two.
• As far as micro transaction models go, Hawken’s is pretty good, and while not ideal, it is not a blatant pay to win system.
• Dodge mechanic adds a nice change of pace to the cookie cutter FPS format.

The Bad:

• Very little customization with the mechs. When you think about mech games, customization is the first thing that comes to mind, and Hawken misses the mark by a sizable margin unfortunately.
• Very few maps available. They get old pretty fast.
• Seems to have a small player base right now. More often than not the teams are unbalanced or you are alone with one other person in the game.
• While the micro transaction system doesn’t use a pay to win model, it could be improved. Everything can be attained without paying, but you will definitely be doing some grinding.

All in all, should you play this?

• If you’re a fan of the FPS genre, and you like the idea of a mecha style FPS, there is really no reason not to give this game a go. It’s by no means a bad game, and any fan of the genre will be able to appreciate what it does right. Also, it’s free!

The Long

I think 100% of the reviews I’ve posted so far on this blog have been regarding single player games, which is a bit misleading, because I really do love multiplayer games, both co-op and competitive. With this in mind, I thought it was high time I write about some of the multiplayer games I’ve been playing, whether it be reviews as I’ve done before, or more informal thoughts about the games, which is what this post will consist of.

I’m going to get the ball rolling with Hawken. This is a game I’ve been super excited about since I saw the first gameplay video a number of years ago. At PAX Prime 2012, I was able to get my hands on the game and play around a bit, and it seemed extremely promising. There was a ton of hype about the game at PAX, the excitement was palpable among the attendees.

For this reason, I was expecting this game to make a huge splash in the PC FPS multiplayer space upon release to the public. Strangely, and maybe it’s still too early to say, but it doesn’t seem to be nearly as popular as I had imagined it’d be.

To be fair, the game is still in open beta, but come on, where’s the hype?! I didn’t hear a peep from anyone when Hawken opened up their beta servers to the public on December 12, 2012. Even to this day, I have seen very little press on this game, and I like to think I keep my ear pretty close to the ground in the gaming space.

This, of course, didn’t stop me from downloading the game and giving it a go. Initially, I was more or less doing a test run, as I couldn’t find any friends to really dive into the game with me. After putting a few hours in, I thought the game had some value to it, and after enough badgering, I eventually got some buddies to agree to give it an honest go with me.

Since then, after putting 8 or 10 more hours into the game, I’ve put it to rest, at least for now. So, I will take this opportunity to give some thoughts about what I thought the strengths and weaknesses of the game are, what I think the developers should do by the go live date to bring me back, and other general opinions.

  The Model

The developers, early on, made the claim that Hawken would not be a pay to win game. This is something I was fairly skeptical of since I was tricked into thinking the same thing with Tribes: Ascend, and ended up being sorely disappointed with that outcome. Much to my surprise, Adhesive Games has done a pretty good job in straying away from the pay to win model.

Looking through the micro-transaction shop, you’ll find that the model is very similar to that of League of Legends. You have two types of currency, one that is only available by purchase, and the other attained through play. The only enhancements that are exclusively available using real dollars are all cosmetic. You can buy new mechs and some of the equippable items using real money, but these are also available for free, using the currency gained by playing.

If you do plan to go the "pay" route, you'll be pleased to know that it's only $5 to unlock a mech class.

While the game still feels a little grindy due to the fairly steep prices to unlock mechs, it’s not unreasonable. Again, I think it can be best likened to League of Legends free to play model, which in my opinion, isn't too bad.

The Game

Okay, so it’s not pay to win. Good! But how’s the actual game? To generalize, Hawken is mech game that employs the mechanics of an FPS. It takes place in a dystopian human-colonized world that has been heavily industrialized. I will say that the aesthetic of the world, and the mechs, is really beautiful. The graphics are top notch and do a great job of making you feel immersed in a gritty, fix-er-upper, mech inhabited world.

There are 10 different mechs available right now, each of which have their own strengths and weaknesses. The mech classes range from slow and tanky to quick and light, varying with both short range and long range weapons. Each mech has 2 primary weapons unlocks, one of which you get very early on (around level 5), and the other you unlock at max level (currently level 25). You’ll also unlock an Offensive item slot (e.g. turrets, EMP, explosives) and a Support item slot (e.g. shield, repair booster, radar jammer). Some of these slots can be filled by default when you purchase the mech, otherwise you have to either spend real money, or a sizable amount of your in game currency to get the items. One thing that is fairly obnoxious about this is that you can’t share items between your mechs, so if you want a rocket turret for all your mechs, you have to unlock that item for each mech separately, making the cost add up fast.

The prices on equippable items like these are a little steep for my taste.

Running and gunning is quite slow and clunky... probably pretty accurate to what it would feel like in a real battle mech. There is a dodge mechanic to speed things up a bit, which allows you to quickly strafe from side to side, using up some of your booster fuel. This is a really nice addition, making fights far more interesting than they would be without this feature. Timing your dodges correctly will almost always decide whether or not you win a battle. Overall, I thought the combat felt very good, even if a little slow.

Another mechanic that I found to be very worthwhile in Hawken is repairing. It’s become almost commonplace for multiplayer games to enable automatic life regeneration when not in combat. This can be infuriating, as you can get an enemy down to 5% life, and if they can stay away from you for X amount of time, their life will fill back up. Not in Hawken! Each mech has a repair ability that can be used to refill your life points, but this ability will take you out of combat completely, and you’ll be left defenseless while repairing. This adds a nice bit of strategy to deciding when and where to retreat to repair.

By now, you’re probably asking yourself why I stopped playing this game, as almost all of this review has been positive. Well, unfortunately, the fun is... fleeting. One of the big reasons for this is the lack of customization on the mechs. Aside from the few unlocks I mentioned in the first paragraph, there’s really nothing else to play around with. You’re limited to those 3 primary weapons (starting + 2 unlocks), and the fairly general offensive and utility items. So after you get to level 5, you’ve really seen most of what your mech can do, and the way that it will handle (at least until max level). Because of this, and maybe it’s just my short attention span, but it gets boring.

The game does utilize a general tech tree system (basically identical to League of Legends’ Mastery system). This tree is the same for everyone, and offers very basic, exclusively passive benefits. These are divvied up into 3 categories (offense, defense, and movement) and are made up of miniscule attribute perks (e.g. 0.33% movement speed). This element of the game seemed extremely generic and, to me, didn’t feel like it added any depth or sense of progression.

Lastly, the map selection is quite bleak at the moment. There are only 3 or 4 maps spread across the 4 game types, and while they’re fairly large, they get old pretty quickly. I assume that this is an issue distinct to beta, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Overall, Hawken is fun, but lacks depth. The absence of truly worthwhile mech customization is probably my biggest complaint. The customization level tops out way too early to keep me engaged for a long period of time. Couple this with the weak map diversity, and you have a fun core gameplay experience that eventually leaves you feeling sort of bored. These are the core elements that I feel need work before the game is pulled out of beta. I’m optimistic that they will make some changes to remedy this, but alas, only time will tell.

The Vids

Quick Review - The Journey Down: Chapter 1

Game Name:    The Journey Down: Chapter 1

Developer:    SkyGoblin
      Engine:              Adventure Game Studio

Platform:     Windows (Reviewed), OS X, Linux, iOS, Android

Genre: Adventure

Release Date: May 12, 2012 (January 9th, 2013 - Steam)

Short description: First chapter of an episodic point and click adventure game where you play as Bwani, part owner of Gas ‘n Charter, a waterfront gas station. The adventure begins with Lina, who wants your assistance in finding an old book that has some highly sought after information on a place called the Underland. We don’t learn too much about the Underland in Chapter 1, except that the government and some large corporations are trying to keep the public in the dark about what is there.

The Good:

• Episodic. Since I played through Telltale Games’ The Walking Dead, I’ve become a fan of the episodic strategy of releasing games. The short, 2-3 hour episodic experiences seem to lend themselves quite nicely to the adventure game genre.
• Every character has a voice actor! I always finds this gives the characters more personality, for better or worse, and thankfully in this case, it's better.
• The dialogue, in addition to being well voiced, is also exceptionally well written. It’s whimsical, funny, and even sort of dark. I laughed out loud on numerous occasions.
• The art is creative and unique. The character's faces are all modeled from various African masks which supplies a unique visual aesthetic.
• While the puzzles aren't terribly difficult, there are some unexpected solutions to puzzles, many of which result in some pretty comical events.

The Bad:

• The game is touted to have full HD graphics, and while the art and visuals are nice, on a 1920x1080 display, things look pretty stretched out. I imagine something like this would be best played on a tablet.
• The game sticks to the standard point and click adventure game format, there’s very little done in the way of creative mechanics.

All in all, should you play this?

• If you’re a fan of point and click adventure games, and in the market for a new and unique story, with odd, whimsical dialogue and voice acting, I’d give it a go. I'm certainly going to pick up Chapter 2 when it releases.

No video this time, but here's a few screenshots to let you know what it looks like...

Quick Review - Antichamber

Game Name:    Antichamber

Developer:    Alexander Bruce
      Engine:              Unreal Engine 3

Platform:     Windows (Steam)

Genre: Puzzle, First person, Platformer

Release Date: January 31, 2013

Disclaimer: As of now, I’m about 95% through the game. I’ve solved nearly all of the puzzles, but there a few still lingering around unsolved. It’s very possible that I will never completely finish this game, but I feel I’ve progressed through enough of it to give an ample quick review.

Short description:  After 4 years of development, Antichamber has arrived! Extremely creative and mind bending exploratory, first person puzzle game set in a seemingly simplistic series of interconnected chambers.

The Good:

• Extremely original, non-euclidean, Escher-like puzzles make for a truly unique gaming experience.
• Graphically appealing. Plain white walls with the occasional splash of color is a surprisingly fitting aesthetic for this type of game. The designer is able to pull your brain in all different directions playing with the color schemes.
• A sufficient challenge! For those that are complaining that games are getting too easy, you'll be happy for a change of pace with this one.
• Philosophical twist. The puzzles are accompanied by small philosophical phrases and cartoon diagrams to loosely guide you along. They oddly taunt you in the midst of a puzzle, but are all the more meaningful once you solve it.

The Bad:

• Little to no direction. Aside from small diagrams you find on the wall, the player is left up to their own devices to figure out what to do and where to go.
• Lack of direction can make some of the puzzles pretty frustrating until you have that “Aha!” moment.
• While sound does play a factor in the game, it's not overly prevalent. I would have liked to see a bit more done with the sound.

All in all, should you play this?

• If you’re looking for an original puzzle game that will twist your brain in very odd directions, I would recommend picking this up. It’s by far the most interesting game I’ve played so far this year, and rivals Portal for one of the most original puzzle games I’ve ever come across.

Here's a glimpse of what this game is like...