Recent reviews by Toast

Honestly, I was really worried my experience in this game was going to be ruined by my nostalgia for the old games. The last one I really played was Lock'n'Loaded and Up Your Arsenal. Some of my favorite games when I was a kid and games I loved so much that I replayed them multiple times. They're a bit dated and I've lost my PS2, bit I'm sure I'd have played them again, especially if they were re-released.

Short story, I didn't go into this game expecting a lot. I was ready to be heavily disappointed because of how often other games from my favorite series have let me down.

Yet surprisingly, I had a blast. The series was more or less exactly how I remembered it, with better graphics and nothing feeling to forced. Sure, a LOT of the dialogue was pretty cringe, but I remember the games back THEN being cringe too.
The combat feels fun, can be difficult, especially on the higher difficulties. Exploring is interesting, though could definitely be expanded on a bit. I feel this one was a tad bit more linear, as well as way easier to 100%. The mechanics of the portals and movement is actually rather fun. It was a bit jarring at first getting used to, but its a really cool game feature. Platforming with everything is pretty good.

My BIGGEST gripe with the game is the arena. I don't know if they expanded on it in previous games and they came across it as being a terrible feature. I checked the release history and at least one of the games was apparently JUST an arena or something. Either way, the arena in this game was absolute garbage. 15 levels split between stages of the game plot, with rewards so small that they're not worth doing. I wouldn't have bothered if I wasn't trying to 100% and every 5th was a bolt of cosmetic. It was a pretty big let down. Don't get me wrong, over emphasis on it would have been really annoying, but there were a lot of aspects to the arena in the two games I mentioned that I liked. I liked the challenge ones. "Fight the boss without getting hit". "Fight the chainsaw boss with nothing but melee." I still remember doing those to this day and I last played the games over a decade ago.

My lesser gripe about the game are the weapons. A lot of the weapons are fun to use, but they seem to be kinda... modernized, and I don't mean that in a good way. I LOVE the fact the game still has the core weapon switching features. The ridiculousness of the combat is why I loved the series to begin with. But honestly, if they took that feature away, I don't know if I'd even have played it, it IS a core facet of the game. I don't quite know if its all nostalgia or misremembering, but I remember the guns being more... ridiculous and out there. Yes, some of them were basically useless, some were alright, and some were literally the most broken overpowered thing ever, but that was FUN. I remember the Bouncer in the earlier games basically launched a ball the size of a car. Then exploded and spawned slightly smaller ones. Basically it killed EVERYTHING in the attack radius. It was insane.
It seems alright to use now... just not really as fun. The craziness WAS the fun. I think they maybe have this thought that everything NEEDS to be balanced be today, people expect every option to be valid. It just lessened the fun a little bit for me.

That said. I DO like the leveling and perk system for weapons. It was pretty cool and made exploration necessary. I'd honestly like it expanded upon a bit in the future for DLC or the next game. It was a good implementation. My only change would be making omega weapons actually... better/unique? While they definitely became better as they leveled, level 10 didn't really change how anything worked with the weapon. Nothing drastic at least. They just did a bit extra damage, or fired a few more shots. Nothing that interesting IMO. I do get why they did that, its a lot of work to essentially bring in 30+ new guns + effects, but it really seemed kinda meh on every gun.
- Maybe the bouncer becomes what it used to be. Massive size and damage and laughably clears rooms.
- Maybe the dimensionator pulls ridiculously sized things.
- Maybe the little robot summoner gets ammo capacity and loses all limits on deployment.
- The mini-gun becomes triple barreled and shoots so fast its basically a continuous beam.

There were even changes they could have easily done. Just make some feature of the gun utterly ridiculous like the radius or attack speed increasing insanely. It just doesn't really feel worth it at all to get to 10. Especially with the price in game.

Overall, I'd rate the game 9/10 or 10/10. I had a blast. I often don't really end up playing single player games all that much these days. A mix of less time to play, games generally just being MORE fun with friends(with the benefit of hanging out WITH those friends), and the stories/game-play in single player games just never really making me care enough to bother. While I can't say I got attached to the story... the game-play I very much did. It was a fun time throughout the entire game. I may have complained about the weapons and arena, but really those are just some things I miss/would like improved upon. I had fun throughout playing and I can't really say that with a lot of games these days.

Also, most importantly of all, I didn't suffer any bugs/crashes/technical issues in my 30+ hours of play. Not a single ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ one. I think my screen flickered a bit, but my monitors just DO that. The fact that this game managed to do that needs to be mentioned. I played this game within 2 weeks of the game being out on Steam. Either they hot-fixed the ♥♥♥♥ out of the game in those two weeks (which even if it was a buggy mess on release would be more than acceptable fix time), or for ONCE, a AAA game was actually QA tested and debugged before it went public. Either a great work ethic or great quality on release. Either one should be celebrated and supported, especially with all the games that release unfinished or so buggy they're barely playable.

Well worth the money, and if it ever goes on sale, you should get it instantly. Its money well spent and I'm looking forward to other games by the studio.

Yes

Yes

Best game of 2020. Thank god something went right this year.

Steep learning curve, but a great game.

Yes

Good

Easily the best of the Counterstrike games. The gameplay is the most stable and balanced. In addition to that, the multitude of maps and game modes can allow for hundreds of hours of enjoyment.

There are few things as satisfying as fighting your way from the lowest levels of nobility to become an Emperor, or as irritating as a single event causing the downfall of your entire dynasty.