GUILD WARS 2

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version reviewed.

GAMEPLAY


STORY


GRAPHICS

SOUND


VALUE FOR MONEY

OVERALL

DARK SOULS: PREPARE TO DIE EDITION

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PC version .

Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition is a RPG published by Bandai Namco and developed by FromSoftware for the Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and PC.

Original reviewed here:

DIFFERENCES FROM ORIGINAL

OVERALL

DARKSIDERS II REVIEW

Repetition defined.

PC version reviewed.

Darksiders II is an action adventure game published and developed by Nordic Games for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Playstation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, Wii U and PC.

 For clarification I played through the Deathinitive Edition and have not actually played the original.

The strange thing about Darksiders II is that with games, unlike movies, the sequels are usually better than the original. The developers take on board the criticisms and do their best to make a stronger sequel with more experience under their belt. However I can't say that Darksiders II seems like a better game than the first one.

This review contains spoilers!

GAMEPLAY
The first big world, The Makers Realm, has a long run of dungeons that all look and feel the same. It made it hard for me to motivate myself to play this game, especially for long spells, because a lot felt so similar. Almost every dungeon uses a rule of three, where you have to through three different sections to complete the dungeon. Almost every dungeon in the main quest line has this in some form and it really is predictable and boring.

Repetition is this games biggest weakness. Most dungeons in each world look the same and are usually just glorified fetch quests. Towards the end of the first world I felt the game was already beginning to drag and was hoping the second world would change up the formula a bit, but sadly it was similar to the first world where most dungeons looked and felt the same. Essentially once you've played the first dungeon in the game then you'll have experienced most of what it has to offer.

The first couple of abilities/weapons you're given are straight out of the original so that's a bit boring. The puzzles in the first game were largely quite fun, aside from when they dragged a little bit towards the end, but in Darksiders II all of the puzzles I encountered just felt kind of bland. They weren't particularly fun, complex or challenging - rather they just took a while to do - and when most of the dungeons already look the same it just sets up most of the game to be bit flat.

There are other small mini dungeons and hidden chests throughout the worlds but I can't really see why those would be very interesting when most of the dungeons feel the same. Just like the original game the horse is a strong point of the game but again goes underutilised. Some of the best parts in the first game were the boss fights were you had your horse, the first major boss in this game is another one that's great fun too but that's the most noteworthy point in the game with your horse. Why not chuck out a few of the repetitive dungeons for more horse combat? It would have increased the variety the game had to offer and made it far more fun. Instead the horse once again goes underutilised and is relegated to largely serving as a glorified taxi to get from place to place, I'm not really sure why they even have the segments in between dungeons because it's just running through a giant largely empty landscape to find the next story line dungeon. Bleh.

The third act is guilty of this too but the maps are smaller, more focused and you start going to varying environments instead of doing similar looking dungeons over and over. It still wasn't amazing but it was a certain improvement over the first two acts. There are still problems though, such as the rushed ending.

Nordic has a cool idea to add in crow who could guide you through parts or perhaps even give you ideas on what to do next in dungeons. However it's broken and just flies around and perches anywhere really. So that's disappointing.

The abilities you can pick up from the skill tree didn't really seem very interesting.

Most boss fights are more enjoyable than the original, although I would say the first game had a higher ceiling for them with the brilliant ones where you had your horse.

Platforming can sometimes be frustrating because Death will sometimes end up running the wrong when trying to climb around which can result in falling to his doom or making simple platforming segments into tedious trials.

STORY
Feels bigger than the first, probably thanks to expanding into different worlds and having more characters. However the pacing felt very slow, perhaps the presence of a pressing antagonist would have helped. Setting it concurrently with the first game may not have done it many favours either, as if you've played the first game you'll know why the main premise of redeeming War just doesn't fit in to the narrative.

The story of the first wasn't great and the second fails to better it. I may have mentioned that this game has slow pacing but the ending feels very rushed, suddenly thrusting a choice upon Death, not the player, that never actually seemed to be a choice that was being considered. I think I see what they were going for, that Death wanted to leave his past behind but when you see how determined he was to stop Absalom and that his focus was always on restoring humanity for War anyway the idea failed to play out very well.

GRAPHICS

The does crash sometimes and seems to have a few bugs too. There's one big one that can even prevent you from finishing the game too.

The art style of the game reminds me of PS Vita/Playstation 3 cross-play games, things like Sly Cooper 4: Thieves in Time and Ratchet & Clank: Into the Nexus. The game just doesn't look like it had that money pumped into it, at least for the graphics anyway. Considering the financial pressure THQ were under it wouldn't surprise me.

SOUND
If there is definitely one thing that Darksiders II does than its predecessor, it's the soundtrack. Jesper Kyd brings a much more vibrant and memorable score than the forgettable soundtrack of the first game. There are some nice pieces but I did feel that perhaps the music did repeat a little bit too much sometimes, that didn't help some of the dungeons that felt similar to differentiate themselves from each other.

There did seem to be a few issues with the sound however. Sometimes it didn't seem to be playing properly, for example the ambient sound and the music would disappear but voices would still play.

VALUE FOR MONEY

OVERALL
I was disappointed in the change from a very Okami/Zelda-esque action adventure game to something more closely resembling an RPG. That's not to say it doesn't still have some of that style, it does still blend a similar combat system together with puzzles and platforming, but it just doesn't have the same feeling as the first - which didn't have the same charm, wonder or refinement, amongst other things, as Okami/Zelda but still felt like an interesting take on the genre - as if the developers had played those other games and thought "I want to do that" even if they didn't nail the recipe - it felt inspired.

Darksiders II just feels uninspired and like it fell back to a solid and simple RPG template instead. It has a straight forward skill tree and a loot system, it even throws in an almost pointless dialogue tree. It takes you to these visually interesting lands but throttles you into boring looking dungeons that will have you thinking deja vu after just the first few as it continues to throw more of the same at you over and over again. It abandons much of the great Zelda/Okami formula of the original. I found it hard to motivate myself to play through the game because it just felt like it wasn't ever getting up to much, and of course it has plenty of bugs too. Would I describe this game as fun? Not at all. It feels like a chore. It's bitterly disappointing and I wouldn't recommend this game at all.

SLEEPING DOGS (2012) REVIEW

Another Grand Theft Auto copy cat, or a new breed of its own?

PC version reviewed.

Sleeping Dogs is an action open-world sandbox game published by Square Enix and developed by United Front Games for the Playstation 3, Playstation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One and PC.

This review has spoilers!

GAMEPLAY

The melee combat in this game is fun, and similar to the Assassin's Creed or Arkham series, although Sleeping Dogs also allows you to use your immediate surrounding environment to your advantage and taking enemies out with these extra additions can make combat a bit more satisfying at times. Guns are also in the game however they all feel very similar, but the game prioritises melee, which was probable a wise decision, as most player will probably prefer the melee encounters.

Other more unique aspects include things like jumping on vehicles, something I found to be a pretty nice edition.

The game does have its annoyances though, certain missions can make you drive across the city numerous times because of poorly placed checkpoints, made even more annoying by Wei Shen refusing to move into cover, meaning you can sometimes die unfairly and then be hit by a double whammy.

Cars feel clunky and the way they handle can be frustrating, especially in the chase segments where you're supposed to knock other cars off the road. Instead of simply slamming into targets, such as in Grand Theft Auto IV, you have to press specific buttons to swing your car over and make sure you smash into them, even pressing this button with a little shove in the back will do damage, but when you smash into them at full speed without pressing this magic button, you'll do minimal, if any damage.

Some missions are very simple point A to B things, carrying other characters around in your car and collecting things for them, often ending in a small fight between you and some enemies. I felt there were a few too many missions where I was sat there thinking why I should care, especially as so many missions don't actually involve the main characters, but people who are just brought in as seemingly random plot points before being forgotten about, never to appear again.

A few bugs caused me some issues too. The most frequent offender was the camera getting caught and refusing to move off a fixed location, usually during certain missions, causing me to have to exit the game and replay them all over again.

STORY

The characters were really generic and boring; I can’t think of one stand out character, they were all so bland. I didn't even realise who the main Triad antagonist was before having a final showdown with him.

Bizarrely there is no choice between the Police and the Triad at the end of the game, even after everything you see of the two and  I can't really understand why there is no option. The game even seems to be setting it up throughout, but in the end makes that big decision without you. The Triad bosses even realise Wei Shen was a police officer all along but just shrug it off because they must have thought he was a pretty chill guy, I thought they were supposed to be ruthless, as they had been portrayed throughout the game.

Late in the game, after being brutally tortured Wei Shen crawls around for a few seconds in pain and then proceeds to punch and kick his way past all his captors, which is something like 20+ men. The logic behind the whole scene fails to make much sense. Why bother to set it up like that if it was just going to turn into another segment similar to many before it, when we could have perhaps had more unique, a stealth section or something, just to give the game a bit of fresh air from the similar levels preceding it.

GRAPHICS

The game looks pretty nice at night and in the rain. However some textures don’t look that good, such as a couple of boats seem to have textures from an early Playstation 2 game. The buildings in the centre of Hong Kong look a bit odd sometimes, whether they're failing to correspond with the lighting around or just sticking out and looking different from the other surroundings.

SOUND

It was nice that most of the voice actors actually sounded like they were speaking with a Chinese accent, rather than the usual generic accents we see in both movies and games. Since so many things do that these days I think this game deserved some recognition for that.

Like the Grand Theft Auto games, Sleeping Dogs doesn't really have many prominent songs that play outside of the radio, and the radio stations seem to fine, with plenty of genres covered.

VALUE FOR MONEY

Main story should give you at least around 12 hours, add in all the side missions and things and you could possibly be looking at around 25 hours. If you enjoy the first few hours you'll likely enjoy the rest of the game too.

OVERALL

Sleeping Dogs seems to try too hard at being a game, that it forgets that it’s also art. They get the basics right, but they miss those big steps to make this game much more than your run of the mill action game. Every positive turn it takes it’ll usually proceed to show you a negative moments later. If you like open world games then it might satisfy your itch for a few hours, but being so generic and boring in some segments, you probably won’t remember the game long after you turn it off.