With the (first?) delay of Darkfall 2, I’ve had some unexpected free time in terms of gaming, and I’ve tried to fill the time with a few different titles. Perhaps the “I’d rather be playing DF2” effect is kicking in, but nothing has really grabbed me of late.
Planetside 2: I picked this up mostly because a few Inq members are playing, despite the fact that it’s an SOE game. KTR covers the first impressions of the game well, and I fully agree. Additionally, I think the game looks atrocious for a shooter. Just something about the character and weapon models looks so off to me, especially in a genre where Battlefield 3 exists. Unfair? Maybe, but there ya go. The draw distance is pretty good, so it has that going for it.
I can’t really get into the game though. Solo its 100% pointless, even by FPS standards. In a group, its better, but then everything is better in a group. It’s still 99% pointless though, as objectives change hands quickly and other than personal progression, what exactly are we fighting over? Maybe it’s because I expected a little more MMO in PS2, when really it’s just a bigger Battlefield with a cash shop? Expecting to uninstall this the day DF2 is out.
Legend of Grimrock: Bought this on a Steam sale for $3, so in terms of value I’m already there. I liked this title for the first few hours, as it’s nice to play something old-school just with a few modern upgrades to graphics and sound. The game has lost me at about the midpoint however. My biggest grip is the combat; rather than RPG tactical pacing, where deciding what to do is more important than how fast you click, LoG instead expects you to ‘exploit’ the game by moving back from mobs after you quickly click your attacks but before the mob can react. I know that’s “working as intended”, but it feels off and rather dumb. I’d like the game far more if it was turn-based.
Along that same line, the difficulty of the game feels wrong to me. The puzzles are fine, a few are a bit too vague, but most are solid and you feel good when you solve them. A few are annoying along the same lines that the combat is annoying, they are more timing based than logical, and LoG has some questionable (at best) controls. If you have sloppy controls, don’t design your game around precision movement or timing.
Finally, most of the secrets lead to great loot. This is somewhat typical, but with the combat difficulty being what it is, it feels like if you don’t get all the secrets, the next level is extra annoying. Not hard, mind you, just annoying thanks to the combat ‘dance’ style. Less loot, more/longer dancing. Zzzzz.
Legend of the Cryptids: P2W card-collecting grind game for the iPhone. Normally I would not mention these because they are all the same and all terrible, but LotC is a giant waste of talent. First off the artwork in the game is amazing. Some of the coolest monster drawings I’ve seen, with good takes on traditional stuff. The special effects are also entertaining while being brief enough to not get annoying. The UI is really solid for an iPhone game, and performs very well.
The problem is there is basically no game here. It’s just click this, see something happen, click again. You upgrade the monsters and such, but it’s never a choice beyond “upgrade everything, eventually”. You can’t lose, just get slightly delayed, and of course you can always pay to move on anyway. The multiplayer aspects are the typical bother strangers and trade stuff for stuff blablabla Farmville.
Again, I only mention it because LotC would be a really solid product if there was a game underneath the beautiful exterior. As it stands, wasted talent/potential.
Hardcore Casual 