Recent reviews by Ignore Me!

Thankfully not every game company is a corporate clown car like Activision or EA. This game is why I love games altogether. Get it and have some f^ckin' fun!

New World is good. It's fun. So why no?

[EDIT 10/29/21 - at bottom]

Great combat? Check.
Great graphics? Check.
Buggy game play? Nope.
Mildly interesting story? I guess....
Cash shop? Ugh.
A game system manipulated to tweek out people with no common sense? Specifically people who will spend thousands to get ahead of everyone else because their adolescently stunted emotional state leads them to believe everything is a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ race? Take a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ guess.

This game will fail as soon as they put short cuts in the cash shop BECAUSE NO ONE WANTS TO PUT TIME INTO SOMETHING THAT TURNS THEIR TIME INTO ♥♥♥♥. OBVIOUSLY. So no, don't bother unless you've already bought it or you have $30 to throw away.

[EDIT 10/29/21 - After much more time in game I still feel like it has it's positive aspects, but it's a drastically dangerous game to play. The game code itself has been found to leave your rig vulnerable to getting bricked by the most common functions in the game. Ask yourself this question: Is a game that you will probably get bored with after 20 hours worth bricking your hard drive and CPU permanently? For me that is a HARD. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. NO.]

Black Desert Online is, in the simplest of terms, the best MMO I’ve played since mid-2009 when the glamour of Wrath of the Lich King started wearing off. If Kakao Games (the publisher) was the cook and BDO was the dish, then the ingredients are 1 part Tekken, 1 part Full Metal Alchemist, 1 part Sudoku, ½ a part of Final Fantasy, another ½ a part of Guild Wars with a dash of your Credit Card number when served.

Look, it’s an amazing game. The combat system all by itself is literally enough to tell people to play the game. Fighting is fun! A lot of fun! Probably some of the best combat in a video game that I’ve played in a long while. Imagine how much fun a great fighting system is in PvP?!?! Differently, when I first seriously looked at the game systems (cooking, crafting, etcetera) I found myself alternately staring into an abyss of things to do and get done while also stunned at the fact that there are no bugs in the game. Let me say that with more clarity:

There are no internal bugs that I’ve come across.

BDO is a clean experience. There are tricks and puzzles in the game. The unengaged NPC banter in the background of what you are doing hints at things and tells you things. The things that your pets and mounts can do have to be learned if you want to be good at them. The items you use are somehow both mysterious and clear at the same time. The game literally can cost ZERO DOLLARS if you catch it on sale because it’s retail price is $10!!! I could go on and on and on… BUT…

There are things that can chafe! Most importantly: the perceived need to use real life money to make the game more palatable. And it is true. The game is like any other MMO. Specifically, it has it’s grinds. The cash-shop in the game drastically reduces this grind. A lot. One could be excused for feeling frustrated when you get into the game and realize that if you don’t spend real money on the game, then you will spend 4 hours crafting what someone else will take an hour to do. It feels bad!

But the game is so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ polished that maybe in this particular circumstance you could spend $10 on something? Maybe you can drop another $5 on this thing? May be this may be that? The real problem in my estimation is that BDO was developed and brought to market in an environment and country (South Korea) where this sort of game environment was both palatable and common. Now-a-days we look at these sorts of systems and justifiably have a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ taste in our mouths.

SO…? Don’t spend any money in the game? Seems legit to me. The combat is still absolutely awesome and the game itself is beautiful to RPG through.

Story may be light and predictable, but the game play is on point. Depth of game play is also on point. Variety of TYPES of game play is also on point. Also, if you got the game on sale for $15 like I did, then you got a gem!

In light of the most recent ♥♥♥♥ storm of garbage out there in the pay-wall ladened video game world I'm glad that this one did not disappoint me. Aside from the free games like Apex and PUBG, I haven't been really "happy" with anything in a while.

Because of the age of the game (2016), I would not advise getting this game at anything like full price. Get it at 60% or more off and you are in for a replayable treat. Go for it.

If CIV 5 is like a rugged, deeply delicious and satisfying steak, then this games is like really watery coffee that's been sitting for hours and hours with no cream around and no sugar to be had.

Perhaps the developer will be able to patch something into this that gives is some kick, but that would be a deeply thick patch. It would be a patch to make it something completely different. I understand that it's a kickstarter thing and for what it's attempted I imagine that there is some heart put into this. None the less I cannot advise anyone buy this game. It's certainly not worth money.

I really want to like this game. The combat is good, the graphics are good, the bugs in the system are at the extents of gameplay (so not really encountered by those not looking for them), there are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ tons of things to do, the building system is deep/interesting and there is a fairly decent story that is also told really well.

I really want to like this game.

If you are a person who likes or loves Rust or ARK, then you should CERTAINLY play this game. You will love it.

I don't think I'm going to play it anymore though. Why? Because PvP servers are basically Mafia simulators. The people who are in the big guild on the server you play will ruin your game at every opportunity. They will kill you for no reason and destroy whatever you build because they are bored. How can they do this you ask? Because the guild that starts with the server opening and pushes to end game content ASAP will have all the best gear and therefore all the advantage. At that point you will be bringing a knife to the hypothetical gun fight. You cannot win.

SO...

I levelled up a bit and then found a place where I wanted to build a base. I farming my ass off for a solid week in order to build an awesome base (which you can see in my screenshots) and then I was confronted with what Conan Exhiles (and likely Rust and ARK as well) is really like in PvP servers. I was ganked by a guy from the big guild and then confronted with a choice: farm rare materials for them or they will destroy my base.

Basic mafia-like extortion.

Yes: it's a pvp server and I should expect this as par for the course. Yes, I could have what I want in a PvE server (and maybe that is what I will do), but NO... this isn't a Conan game. To a certain extent the idea of a Conan game is here. You can be in a small guild... out to go kill the people in the big bad guild who are the mafioso jagoffs enslaving the server because they are douche-bags. Like Conan you can litterally track them down, attack and maybe kill them. Unlike Conan you will not win because they will respawn 10 seconds later and then proceed to whipe you from the server.

This is a great game that has the look and sometimes the feel of Conan, but the reality is very different. Clearly interesting in various cool ways, but I have the taste of trash and ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ in my mouth and it's hard to forget.

I imagine that there is a really great way to talk about the methods and strategies that Iron Oak Games used to create this game in such a specifically interesting way... but I honestly don't know enough about HOW games are made or anywhere near enough about development theory itself to go down that road.

Instead let me just say that this little gem is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ fun. I'm enjoying it a lot. For it's cost we are getting a LOT of good game time here.

EDIT - 3/16/18 - Since I originally reviewed this game it has obvi blown up. For the money it costs I imagine that it's probably one of the single best multiplayer shoot-em-ups I've ever played. I can tell you that any other game that had this many hackers would completely turn me off, but PUBG is something different: enjoyable for more than the gun play... it's fun and funny too. Enjoy.

Long story short: Great game, wait till it's released in some sort of final form... UNLESS you have $30 to spend on this game now and advance it's development.

Short story long: I really enjoy this game. I've won this thing 4 times and each time was flat out amazing. Why? Because winning an arena game agains 98 other players is intense.

So why wait? Let me couch this for you: 75% of the games you will die to a camper that you didn't hear and didn't see, 5% of the time you will die to a sniper and the rest of the time you will play a great game. 1 in 5 games will be "good". Long odds to be sure. Now dash in the random hacker that shoots through walls or one shots you with the most inaccurate weapon in the game at 50 yards. Throw in some server latency problems that cause people to blink around. Finally: the game is still in development. It's early access. So, the hackers will have free reign because they're 12, have nothing better to do and the developers don't have the resources to keep up with them. Also, the servers are what they are because the developers don't have the resources to manage server overhead the way a company like Blizzard can and does.

With the resources behind it PUBG could be aesthetically clean, bug free, lag/latency free and hack free. That game would blow any other FPS out of the water. It would be a sea-change in the way people approached multi-player games. Fun. Exciting. Amazingly fun. But currently it is not that game. Furthermore: it may never be that game.

PUBG has serious problems right now. If you don't like early access games, then I would not buy this. Dying to a hack is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ intolerable... BUT, the developers are working on the game. They are addressing bugs and adding content. The big question is whether or not those problems will be addressed in any kind of timely fashion. Will it be complete in June? July? I think if this game is released from early access by Thanksgiving it would be a miracle. I have a feeling that we are looking at something that will be in development for a long long time... which is a tragic ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ shame because under all the bugs and ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ it's a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ great game. More than that: because it is a small team that is developing the game and taking into account the history of most "early access" games... this game may never be completed in the way we think of something like Overwatch as being a completed game.

The fact that this isn't likely to be polished and completed is heart-breaking. This could be an absolute masterpiece... COULD be... but sadly is not likely to be anything more than an interesting moment in the history of games. It is far more likely that the developers will leave this project in 6 months and split up. Later we'll see little pieces of PUBG in other big titles and think back on this game with a smile on our faces.

I love this franchise. Human Revolution brought us a beautiful Cyberpunk world so close we could taste it. I am completely biased. I want Mankind Divided to be good. More, I want it to be ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ orgasmically amazeballs.

The conclusion first: Eidos made a semi decent, but short game and have decided to leverage every last gigabyte of it's content for as much ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ money as possible. This shows us that they don't give a good ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about the actual content of the game at all and I urge you to buy this some time in late 2017 for $10 to $20 with all of it's DLC included.

The explaination next as the good, the bad and the ugly:

THE GOOD - Running around in this fiction-made-real is really amazing. I have a 1070 and parts of this game are just beautiful. I'm beginning to see how close we are to crossing "The Uncanny Valley" (look it up) and it's sobering. The level design is awesome, complex and has genourous amounts of attention to detail.

The AI, in combat and otherwise, is great. I am currently playing at "Give me the Deus Ex" difficulty and it is really interesting how widely variable and unpredictable the AI is. Yes, there is pathing, but no... the AI does not seem to stick to a "path". Hard to explain, but that's why it's just so great!

The story itself hits some tough, socially topical and sensitive points. Interestingly, one could simply switch the words Trump for Human Restoration Act , I.S.I.L. for Illuminati , Jihadist for ARC and basically have the set piece within which the action of the game happens. There is a lot to think about. If it were not for the inclusion of the motivationally felshed-out Illuminati character Miller, then the idea that somewhere out there in the Deus Ex world exists a hollowed out volcano Illuminati base would really be prominent. This is not the case though and it speaks very clearly to the developer's credit... even though they have a base in the Alps full of idiot goons. I don't know... whatever.

THE BAD - Flat out: if you don't have a decent graphics card, then the game gets really crashy really quick. For whatever reason: there are very specific crashes related to this issue that A LOT of people are having even when the game is set very low. Be warned.

The brow-beating-nature of some plot pieces is over the top, it's dumb storytelling, a failed attempt to establish continuity from HR to MD, it's poorly executed and it shows.

The game is great to look at, but really jinky to get around in. Poorly exectuted object physics is wierd and completely pulls you out of the narrative.

The game is TOO ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ SHORT. So far, Breach included, I've played this thing completely through THREE ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ TIMES. Truth be told you could play through this completely in one hour if you skipped as much exposition as possible.

THE UGLY - ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ microtransactions! I honestly didn't know about them until a friend of mine asked me if they were annoying. They aren't, but micros in a single player PC game is just wierd. Makes you wonder what the ♥♥♥♥ they were thinking in light of the terrible backlash? I blame Corporate pressure. Some douchebag with clout that has no ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ clue about the PC market sat down and told Edios to include this ♥♥♥♥ because they see how well it does in the mobile appverse. Full stop.

So...

Should you buy this? As it stands, at $60? No. I ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ love cyberpunk games. I love(d) this franchise. I'm so completely biased that it's hard for me to be objective about this at all. I mean, $60 is enough for a fully legal blowjob in Japan... by a hot little chick who loves her job!

All that and I'm telling you that this is NOT worth the money.

Now, if the DLC comes out as just as good or better a play-through as the core MD game, the DLC in total is far longer than the core game and in the end there is a generally understood idea that the DLC is flat out amazing... then O.K. Then this could be considered worth the $90 for the game and the DLC season pass. Who am I kidding though. I played through the day one DLC already. It was ♥♥♥♥. It was boring. I can't remember much of it and that's not surprising since it took me all of 10 minutes to completely run through it.

In conclusion:

I'm on the fence. It's not a really comfortable fence. I mean, I LIKE the fence. I have enjoyed the fence. It's a nice fence! It is. It's just that the people who made the fence are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ apparently. They really just are NOT my friends. I paid them for the fence happily. I knew that it would be a nice fence, but when I got home and looked at my new fence? The construction workers wanted more money for it and that's just a ♥♥♥♥ move. They were being all surley and threatening about it like if I didn't give them the money, then something bad would happen to the fence. Nothing bad can possibly happen to the fence though... so what? They were just ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about it because they could be? Lame. ANYWAY, I'm not using these guys for work again I think... at least not until they show me they aren't just a bunch of ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ anymore.

As stated above: Eidos made a semi decent, but short game and have decided to leverage every last gigabyte of it's content for as much ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ money as possible. This shows us that they don't give a good ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about the actual content of the game at all and I urge you to buy this some time in late 2017 for $10 to $20 with all of it's DLC included.

It's not like Eidos is CD Projekt RED. This game is no Witcher 3. Sure, it's fun and pretty... but it's too ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ short and it still has problems. In the meantime watch this video for CD Projeckt RED's upcoming cyberpunk thriller named "Cyberpunk 2077". Enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7_ZTI1OwCk

Release day 08-12-16: I will edit this on further gameplay and will come out with an actual review at some point in the future, BUT... It has to be said that YOU SHOULD ALL STAY THE ♥♥♥♥ AWAY FROM THIS GAME. I am very unhappy with what I'm playing at the moment. It feels unfinished, buggy as ♥♥♥♥ and far from anything worth $60.

Look for an actual review coming soon.

08-13-16: So apparently the bigger bugs are being addressed and the game is playable... more or less, but I would still advise caution. This is supposed to be a premium game. Nothing for $60 should be this ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ broken out the gate. I mean, you still can't even alt-tab without the game crashing like a little ♥♥♥♥♥ for ♥♥♥♥'s sake. That's like... a BASIC function for PC games. Who the ♥♥♥♥ lets that happen?

I dunno. Whatever. I'm majorly on the fense about this game right now. It feels a lot like it was released earlier than it should have been.

Actual review coming soon.

08-13-16: FINAL REVIEW - Do not purchase this product. It is not a finished commodity and likely will never be worth the amount of money that they want from you for it. The game is shallow, full of bugs and completely frustrating.

Someone I was talking to said to me that they were hoping that it was like a Mass Effect open world game... and I think that pretty well describes what I wanted from it. Unfortunately this game does not have teh depth or gravitas ME had in even it's worst moments.

This is a terrible waste of time and money. If it was free, then it might be worth your time to experience it's environments and odd sensabilities, but this game is NOT free and therefore an overhyped train wreck.

Stay far far from it. I wasted my time and money... I hope you do not.