Child of Light
Funshine Bear was hurtling towards my screen with sniper precision. My 7-year old daughter is a stuffed toy-throwing expert. She really fell in love with the lead heroine, Aurora, and each dramatic encounter would leave her aghast as the story unfolded. In this case a plushie bear attack was warranted as Child of Light got real right there. Funshine Bear might have lost a bit of stuffing too. The game was my choice for our daddy-daughter gaming nights and we enjoyed it so much, it warranted two playthroughs.
– Real player with 40.1 hrs in game
My review for Child of Light:
First of all, I’m going to address 2 concerns that I found in Steam community hub:
1. Uplay
Those who’re going to buy this game should know that this game is going to use Uplay, Ubisoft own game client. I noticed that many people dislike Uplay for certain reason so gonna respect that. I have my own issue with Uplay as well. So if you want to buy this game, make sure you know what you’re getting into.
2. Day 1 DLC
When the game is released, the dev put several DLCs immediately, including Golem DLC and Dark Aurora DLC which is the Special Edition bonus DLCs, Light Aurora DLC which is the preorder bonus and several “cheat” DLC which you can buy extra oculis for your game. Golem DLC gives you a new party member and a small quest to get him, while Light Aurora and Dark Aurora DLC give you skins for Aurora and extra oculis and bonus stats. The “cheat” DLC is actually consists of oculis, which means you can buy the oculis using real money once. Among these DLCs, only Golem DLC adds a bit of content while the skins just for eye candy. As much as I hate day 1 DLC, if you want to support the dev, buy the Golem and the skins DLC only. Of course you can ignore the DLCs if you don’t want to support day 1 DLCs. I myself didn’t bought any of the DLCs except Light Aurora since I preorder it.
– Real player with 36.8 hrs in game
FINAL FANTASY IX
TL;DR: Every long-life gamer has that particular game considered life-changing. To me, Final Fantasy IX is that game. And to me, this is the best game that a life being have ever crafted. Yes, I say “life being”, not “human”, because I’m assuming aliens have their own videogames. But they won’t be as good as Final Fantasy IX.
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Okay, here comes a very long review. I’ve been waiting this for so long.
First of all, completely ignore my time count on Steam for this game. I’ve put 1000h+ into it, and I can easily make a perfect run by memory. Do you know that particular favorite movie you watch every single year? Well, I do that but with this game.
– Real player with 123.9 hrs in game
Read More: Best Great Soundtrack Singleplayer Games.
While I do recommend this game, I’d suggest getting it only if it’s been discounted. Final Fantasy IX is my absolute favorite game of all time but this “remaster” leaves a lot to be desired.
As mentioned in many, many other reviews, the new interface is really big and ugly and is clearly just the same interface they used for the mobile port. The original interface was actually quite good and it’s a shame it wasn’t restored for the PC port.
Sadly, there’s also a lot of bugs that have gone unfixed since launch, most notably the overworld music glitch. It likely won’t be terribly noticeable to those new to the game but in the original upon entering a random encounter the overworld music would actually pause so that when you exited battle it would pick up where it left off. That is sadly not the case in this version. Every time you have an encounter the music will restart. This is incredibly annoying and quite upsetting since Over the Hills is a beautiful and LONG song but it is perpetually restarted nearly every 10 seconds as encounters are fairly common. This IS a jrpg from 2000, afterall.
– Real player with 118.2 hrs in game
Ori and the Blind Forest
Beautiful game and the graphics are amazing. However, if you plan to use a controller, be aware that some of the controls could be switched with keyboard at any time and might mess up a charge jump or an ability. Hopefully they fix this, but other than that, recommended!
– Real player with 85.6 hrs in game
Read More: Best Great Soundtrack Atmospheric Games.
One of the best games of its genre, no doubt. Beautiful graphics, amazing music, even the lore is great. Level design and movement are very good with very satisfying feel to it. The only flaws are combat, which is lacking and too simple. There is no difficulity option in this version, and that might be a problem for more casual gamers. And lastly some achievements are bugged, which is a bit annoying for completionists. I would probably suggest playing the dafinitive edition, as it is a little bit more polished, but the game for itself is just amazing.
– Real player with 14.4 hrs in game
Starlight of Aeons
Negatives:
Main program is flagged as a malware by Windows Defender so you have to get around that to install this.
No full screen support
No text speed option
No framerate lock
4 hr kinetic novel with full Chinese VA (none on 3rd story, “1/30000 Days to Love” though). There are 3 stories, but the first 2 just make one story together. Good writing/narrative, characters, and art. Great soundtrack. Philosophical.
– Real player with 7.4 hrs in game
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– Real player with 5.2 hrs in game
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind® Game of the Year Edition
I think that this is a really well made game. I’ve enjoyed the freedom and atmosphere that the game gives you, the unique setting was really cool, and I felt that the choices that you make in this game have more of a impact than later Elder Scrolls games. There are some problems though, mainly with the fact that there is no way to manually fast travel on your own (without using Mark/Recall or having to pay for it at specific areas in the game), and slow run speed. There was also a bit too many fetch quests in my opinion, but theses problems are small and minor when in comparison to the wealth of great things that the game does well. Highly recommend it!
– Real player with 160.8 hrs in game
A true no frills adventure game. I cannot highly recommend it enough. A few points to follow though -
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Download mods. Please do not play this without them and expect a great experience. Don’t turn yourself away from the game right away. It’s nearly 20 years old at this point, the game could use all the help it can get.
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Take it easy. There’s no wrong way to play. There are certainly “sub-optimal” builds for your character, but that’s the fun of the game. You want to swing a big ass mace and cast spells in light armor? Go for it.
– Real player with 138.4 hrs in game
Umineko When They Cry - Question Arcs
Ryukishi07, you sadistic bastard, I love you.
Before getting this one, I would recommend you to at least try to read the Higurashi When They Cry series. They’re amazing visual novels that have some connection to Umineko’s plot. Don’t worry, they’re not required, but they’re also great stories that, if you finish them, you’ll have a whole different view on some of Umineko’s important characters.
Umineko is a story about sin, punishment, guilt, trauma and especially love. Written by Ryukishi07, who had experience as a social worker, it’s a mystery in it’s core, but not entirely. The content ranges from bittersweet love stories to chuuni fantastic logic and reasoning battles, where arguments take form as weapons. How can you have so many different kinds of dilemmas in one story? Well, just look at the hour counts which people who read this series have on Steam. It’s easily an 100+ experience.
– Real player with 112.4 hrs in game
This is a review of the whole of Umineko, not just the Question Arcs. Just so you know.
Mystery stories are, at their core, just one big puzzle. An author writes a story, gives you hints, and typically tells you all you need to know before the story’s conclusion so that you have a fair chance at figuring it out if you’re perceptive enough. Good mystery authors make it possible to figure out the killer long before they are revealed in the story. But it has gotten to the point that many people either don’t try and figure it out, or if they do, their guesses are far more lukewarm, because they know the story will succinctly reveal everything at the end of the story and wrap everything up in a nice little bow. Umineko, on the other hand, does not do this. Umineko lays out clues for you and tells you to figure it out yourself, not directly revealing the answer to a majority of its individual mysteries, and, while giving you more hints to its biggest mysteries, never outright stating the answer. What makes the story even more difficult to solve is the constant questioning of whether what you’re seeing is true or false, and whether or not the murders are truly being done by magic, not helped by the constant seemingly impossible closed room murders. Can you figure out the truth? That’s up to your observational skills.
– Real player with 108.7 hrs in game
FINAL FANTASY® XIII-2
I played most of the final fantasy games since when I was young, before FFX10 and FFVIII came to steam. I used to play them in a very old Windows XP and a Windows 7 computer. Back then those games was always refreshing and broke the usual norms held by video games. I always wanted to play FFXIII series- it was a dream to me. Regardless of course I jumped to FFXIII-2 without playing the prequel for various reasons. I did saw a lot of videos related to FFXIII and I could say it’s more epic than this. But, I think it was a bit too much when people say that FFXIII-2 is bad compared to most Final Fantasy games. In terms of bugs, FFXIII-2 is indeed bad and frustrating. But you have to understand this is a badly ported game and I never let that bothered me really. There are many workarounds for the bugs and some worked for me. With that said, I managed to get all of the achievements (most were ridiculous), completed the DLC and the main story and my judgment is the story is epic. Since the bugs were bad I’d first start the review with that.
– Real player with 130.7 hrs in game
I’m convinced this game is a work of satire. The plot is so contrived you stop halfway and realize that Square is just fucking with you.
Here’s an example: there’s a machine in the past that kills its creator and creates a future filled with robots. What caused it to kill its creators? Itself in the future corrupted the machine in the past to kill its creators. Why? Because if it didn’t force the machine to kill its creators in the past it wouldn’t exist in the future as the sole controller of the world. The Machine came from a future that didn’t exist so that it could continue existing and create that future.
– Real player with 124.5 hrs in game
FINAL FANTASY XII THE ZODIAC AGE
FF12 is an outlier. It’s the only numbered FF game directed by Yasumi Matsuno, creator of FF Tactics. And it is also the only numbered FF game to re-use existing world, called Ivalice, again originally from FF Tactics. This should not be a problem since chonologically it takes place thousands of years before any other game. Instead you get expansive world with many original races and nations, it easily puts most, if not all, other FF games to shame. And yes, to address the elephant in the room, it gives strong Star Wars vibes.
– Real player with 162.3 hrs in game
I liked this game but I also hated it. Because it doesn’t have a maybe button I have to go with the dislike button because I complain more about the bad things than acknowledge the good. Which honestly is Balthier and Fran. Didn’t care for Vaan..didn’t care for Ashe. I wanted to know more about Balthier and Fran than any of the other characters. He’s a pirate for god sake that would’ve been way interesting than hunting down glowing stones. Yes, we did get a little Fran story but I rather find out how they met than what the hell I got with Vaan and Ashe. They could’ve made a story about that. I think Square decided to making Vaan the main character of this Final Fantasy was a mistake. I rarely used the Espers at all. Not sure why anyone would other than progressing through the story which some are mandatory to fight. The gambit system didn’t work for me I just kept attacking and healing and I played the whole game on 2x fast mode..because I didn’t think that it was worth paying on normal speed. The journal in which you have to track what mission you are on is at the bottom of the map menu but only will tell you the main quest. Not even the sidequests are logged anywhere. You wouldn’t even know that they are side quests in this game unless you’re taking on hunts which is a pain in itself. A perfect example of a bullshit side quest is the three medallion quest. Without a guide, you would never figure out that you have to talk to certain people in different areas of Rabanaster. To get to the map on your location you have to go through 5 pages to get to that and the clan primer page in which you have to access all the time and that’s only if you accepted a hunt then back out of those pages to get back to the game. 5 pages it gets annoying..doing that all the time to find where I am at. They decided to let you have a map on screen but sometimes the map is too big that it obstructs your view on playing the game that you have to back out the map and go through all those pages to the map to back out again. I had a hard time tracking the Hunt club quest that I had to go online to get the correct information on what the hell I was supposed to track and how. This game doesn’t tell you anything worthwhile. It is like they made this game so you have to buy the strategy guide. I really wanted to love this game but I can’t recommend it. Play Final Fantasy 10 or even 9. Those are great games.
– Real player with 125.0 hrs in game
Age of Wonders
=== Age of Wonders - Game Review, Turn-based Strategy - 10/10 ===
If you like turn-based strategy, whether it’s in a table top game or a video game, Age of Wonders is at the top of the list.
Age of Wonders was released back in 1999, so we’re getting pretty close to the grand 20-year mark in age. For such an old game, you might think it would look pretty aged and unable to hold up to present-day gaming. In my opinion, this game is a classic that is still plenty of fun to play and has a great art-style that still looks great even to this day. If you go back to the original pictures of this game before it was released, the art is so simple and would easily have gotten old pretty quick. Thankfully they decided to go in a bit of a different direction which I think looks like someone painted it by hand; this sort of painted-looking art-style is definitely my favourite. Of course the visuals are important when deciding whether or not to play a game, but there’s so much more to talk about.
– Real player with 385.4 hrs in game
Age of Wonders is a fairly old game, but I still very much enjoy its simple yet complex gameplay. While its sequels improved vastly on some aspects of the game, I still feel that combat was the most entertaining in the original.
The story is fairly straightforward, and unlike the later titles, allows you to play as the “Good” faction or the “Evil” faction for the story. At several segments, you’ll be presented with a decision to make, but only the second and third decisions will influence the Campaign any. These two decisions will also alter the ending sequence.
– Real player with 336.0 hrs in game
Final Fantasy IV (3D Remake)
Where do I even begin with how special this game is to me? I was introduced to the legacy of Final Fantasy IV through the DS remake not long after it released, so it’s not like I’ve had decades to dwell on it, but the game struck a chord with me from the very start. The music is enchanting, the story is gripping, the voice cast is phenomenal, and the gameplay hasn’t aged a day. For my review, I’d like to elaborate on each of these points one at a time to give a better sense of what I love about Final Fantasy IV.
– Real player with 109.5 hrs in game
This game should be the Gold Standard when comes to “remakes” for it was properly done. The faithfulness that the developers at Matrix Software that took the pains and applied the wisdom to properly enhance the locations from the original that was unable to execute due to the limited capacities on the Super Nintendo (Famicom) now have been given the proper authentic vision the original developers envisioned.
For example: Damcyan (the desert-kingom) has taken the “middle-eastern” flavor and Fabul with its “Chinese” reflection; and of course, Eblan with its “ninja” embracement.
– Real player with 85.5 hrs in game