Castlevania: Lords of Shadow – Ultimate Edition
First off, I’m a huge fan of the Castlevania series. So that foundation may color my opinion of this game and it’s ensuing interquel and sequel (which I’m currently in the midst of). Something about medieval through Enlightment era Europe with a heavy gothic/baroque aesthetic, corrupted through dark forces that threaten the world? Awesome. Tons of monsters pulling on a multitude of inspiration from the myth cycles of antiquity through the modern Universal monsters? Yes, please.
Konami struck gold initially by creating these dark adventures that took a quite serious tone for the early Nintendo systems, offering a beefy challenge of vintage Nintendo difficulty through several increasingly impressive platformer games. They then evolved into the famed Metroidvanias with the release of Symphony of the Night on the Playstation - trading a bit of the reflex-intensive difficulty for massive sprawling environments that took forever to explore and fully unlock - and followed this formula with several excellent installments on Nintendo’s handhelds where they found their most sustainable home and success through the late 2000’s. Then Konami, sensing the increasingly stagnant nature of the series as it became mired in repeated iterations of SotN’s sprawling platformer/RPG hybrid, started searching for a way to revitalize the series again, just as SotN ignited a sort of Golden Age for the series.
– Real player with 98.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Controller Action Games.
(Important note: This game, for whatever reason, doesn’t like being set to fullscreen + max res on a display other than that which Windows / your video card identifies as Display 1, regardless if it’s your primary display or not. Weird bug but easy to fix.)
Lords of Shadow is a flawed but polished masterpiece and a triumph of artistic direction. It’s shortcomings are forgivable. That said, since you can expect to sink upwards of 40hrs into this, I’ll go into some more detail.
Presentation wise, this game is stunning. Masterful visuals paired with smooth and optimized 4K performance make for an eye-popping experience. The art team went all out on this and it shows. I’ve never taken so many screenshots of a game before. Two major detractors though: 1. Some of the cutscenes were pre-rendered for console are unimproved by modern hardware (they still look passable but they’re jaggy af); 2. Godrays are a weak point. The score is powerful but not iconic; you’ll love it in the moment but try to recall the music later and you’ll likely struggle, for the most part. This isn’t objectively a bad thing, as it simply means it’s enhancing the experience without overpowering it but I was disappointed by the lack of iconic singles and the abscence of a Bloody Tears revamp.
– Real player with 47.4 hrs in game
Crowkart
Experience the amazing karting world of Crowsworn in glorious 3D while racing against your friends online. Choose a racer from among the characters of the Crowsworn universe (and beyond) and get ready for many fast-paced and wacky races! Use your driving prowess, never forget to drift and you will become the Crowkart Champion!
Game Features
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MULTIPLAYER up to 8 players in a single race.
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5+ CHARACTERS from the Crowsworn universe, each with their own particular driving style
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10+ TRACKS have been carefully crafted to showcase the various lands of Fearanndal and to challenge the player’s driving abilities
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9+ RACING ITEMS to take advantage of in order to win your race!
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A BADASS ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACK composed by J.J. Ipsen
Read More: Best Controller 3D Games.
Dead by Death
(follow my curator page GenXPlayers for more retro and indie reviews)
I looked forward to playing this game , and don’t pay attention to my playtime as I did play it mostly offline.
Unfortunately, this castlevania wannabe falls short . The levels are vast labyrinths with generic castlevania graphics populated with a mish mash of heteroclite enemies. The enemies are very varied but the graphic styles and proportions sometimes clash and a small bat can be deadlier than a huge werewolf with dual sabers.
– Real player with 0.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Controller Action Games.
CANT FIND THE KEY where is it up your starch kiddingly butt hole MALE SMOKES
– Real player with 0.7 hrs in game
A Quiver of Crows
@C.:
_Les mouches bourdonnaient sur ce ventre putride,
D’où sortaient de noirs bataillons
De larves, qui coulaient comme un épais liquide
Le long de ces vivants haillons.
Tout cela descendait, montait comme une vague,
Ou s’élançait en pétillant ;
On eût dit que le corps, enflé d’un souffle vague,
Vivait en se multipliant._
A Quiver of Crows game. You, as a flying being, ‘a crow’, shooting with some lasers into some relentless ever-respawning undeads of various sorts.
– Real player with 6.8 hrs in game
This game needs some reviews, so I want to do a 2-hour first impression. The art in this game is astoundingly well developed. It wordlessly creates a lot of ambience as you fly your way through abandoned playgrounds and discarded remnants of civilization as a new dawn approaches a terrible day…
You play a freaking bird with laser weapons. If you’re still reading this, you want this game. It’s hard. Quite hard, but it can be enjoyed in bursts of 10 minutes or a whole rage inducing hour. The controls are extremely tight, and the weapons and enemies are all interesting. My favorite are the basic enemies, which I call the “Dental Association” as they chomp me to bits.
– Real player with 6.6 hrs in game
Darkness Maze Cube - Hardcore Puzzle Game
Amazing game!
any mistake ends up leading to your death, pay attention to every detail. test your skills and memory, solving puzzles and trying to stay alive every second.
Participating in the closed test was such a great experience,
now I’m trying to improve my score!
– Real player with 197.0 hrs in game
Amazing!
I participated in the closed tests and it really is a game for those who enjoy challenges and strong emotions …
Not taking the save and dying … makes you think “Why, why didn’t I go to get the save first?”
The team is to be congratulated, the game was thought of details, paying attention to the paths, sounds and details of the environment really helps to prevent traps.
I took several scares … rsss
Very cool!
Congratulations!
– Real player with 42.8 hrs in game
Deathtrap
+ Pros +
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A very entertaining gameplay
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A large amount of traps and skills that allow a diversified gameplay
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A functional multiplayer mode
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Stunning and detailed graphics.
- Cons -
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Serious balance and design problems with certain levels.
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A high price for a game that reuses existing models and doesn’t introduce anything revolutionary.
Gameplay
Deathtrap is a spinoff to The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing series. It’s based on the tower defence mechanics, estrapolated directly from its parent. It’s similar to Sanctum, mixing turrets and playable characters with their passive and combat skills defending a point from incoming waves of enemies.
– Real player with 47.6 hrs in game
Deathtrap is an interesting combination of tower defence and action RPG in a fantasy setting. The player has to stop an assortment of demonic creatures from reaching portals. You do this by building traps along the creatures path, and you also control a character that can move around the map and attack the creatures directly. Its similar to Orcs Must Die, but with a more elevated camera angle.
The player character can be either a warrior, rogue or mage depending on if you want to focus on melee or ranged attacks. You move with arrows/wasd, have a basic attack on LMB and upto 5 other abilities on hotkeys. These abilities cost rage/mana which is generated by using the basic attack, and there are more than 5 abilities to choose from, plus several passives, so you can build a character that suits your playing style.
– Real player with 38.8 hrs in game
Gothica : The Devil’s Shadow
Gothica: The Devil’s Shadow is a single player, steampunk-influenced, adventure puzzle game designed for VR. Professor Van Helsing, the famous monster hunter, is not what he used to be. He needs your help. An insidious shadow is choking London and Van Helsing is assembling a team to fight back.
This introduction to the alternate reality of a Gothic London under siege begins as you’re recruited to help Van Helsing. A coach journey through the streets gives you a glimpse of the shadowy world that London has become as the Dark Lord’s influence grows. The coach driver gives you the lowdown and you learn about Van Helsing’s plight from a special mechanical storybox. But once you arrive at the entrance to Van Helsing’s HQ, before you can enter, there’s the small matter of an initiative test to pass. Only it’s not just the puzzle that will prove challenging. It’s safe to say that, for once, you’ll wish you were alone in the dark…
Hippocampus: Dark Fantasy Adventure
Unplayable mess. I can live with plain ugly graphics but not when it’s the best part of the game nevertheless.
It’s not souls-like at all (it was the reason why I bought it) because there are no souls/experience, no leveling, no char stats, no inventory, no stamina, no death run … no nothing.
There are parcur elements which you will repeat tens of times each because of how poorly they are designed. It’s necessary to hit very small objects during jumps, double jumps and/or free fall, hit them under very specific angle and at the same time rotate camera in three dimensions (while the screen is shaking and/or tilting). And you have to hit several objects in a row (sometimes around the corner) or repeat the whole sequence from beginning. And no, it’s not getting any better using mouse+keyboard instead of gamepad.
– Real player with 11.7 hrs in game
Hippocampus:
Lord Moebius has a lot of virtues; he is fit as a fiddle, possesses a large number of lands in his kingdom and abroad, and his chests are full of gold coins. But Lord Moebius hasn’t found love, and every single lady in his kingdom is glowing with beauty in the hope of stealing his heart and becoming his wife. Someone did just that when he was on a trip abroad! Her name was Lorelei and they shared a deep love; so deep that people within Lord Moebius’ palace felt greatly threatened and started investigating Lorelei. Soon afterwards, she disappeared without a trace! Desperate to see her again, Lord Moebius used a powerful hallucinogen to project his memory into reality in order to see her. But memory is not reality and plenty of things can be disrupted. You are about to find out in Hippocampus!
*– [Real player with 5.8 hrs in game](http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198003030375)*
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## Hyde & Seek
Perfect Christian game for children because it promotes values such as love, friendship and compassion.
Will update this review once I'm done hiding in my closet. Excited for Hyde and Seek 2!
*– [Real player with 3.6 hrs in game](http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198843166838)*
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## Risen 2: Dark Waters
Risen 2 is a third person open world action roleplaying game made by Piranha Bytes, the team that gave us the Gothic games and of course the first Risen game. It's hard to talk about Risen 2 without referring to their previous games, which I'll call 'PB games' for short.
To summarize: Risen 2 sometimes feels like a 'PB game lite' but it's certainly not completely dumbed down from previous PB games. The atmosphere and the 'feel' of the PB games is there, so I'll enjoy playing this game more than I would 9 out of 10 similar games. The fact that melee combat is almost as bad as it was in Gothic 3 and the absence of 'real' magic are the only two problems that certainly knock off some points in the final score for Risen 2.
*– [Real player with 74.2 hrs in game](http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198042646749)*
### It is very difficult to recommend this game because depending on your personal preferences, it can either be a wealth of unpleasantness or it can, as I have in the end perceived it, be a gem of extraordinary substance and enjoyment although in a wierd way.
Warning: This will be quite a lenghty review where I try to outline in detail the great drawbacks of the game as well as the great features about it.
### First off, I will state all of the unpleasant aspects of this game and if anything I mention seems unacceptable, better to stay away from it as it is a game that not everyone will enjoy and it can be difficult to grasp.
*– [Real player with 69.2 hrs in game](http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198152014437)*
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