Recent reviews by 𝕤𝕠𝕞𝕖𝟡𝟘𝟘𝟘

Fantastic game, absolutely deserves all the praise it has received. I didn't care much for Telltales other games, or the "story" of the general Borderlands games, but this one just so well made and written, it's up there with the greats. It may not be perfect, but by the end you'll have only fond memories of your time with it.

Now for another playthrough.

Fantastic little "vertical Metroidvania". You gather stuff, improve your gear and proceed ever deper to uncover a mystery. I finished it on Vita back when it came out and certainly enjoyed it on the "big screen" of the PC version as well.

In addition to the gameplay virtues that other reviews have mentioned for sure, it's also a very small download and is quite well optimized and entirely playable on a windows tablet (with a gamepad), which is great.

For the current price (0.77€) this is a no brainer, even if it is just a single episode to get you hooked for the rest. There are two (pretty tense) story segments with different characters that will take you a couple of hours to do the first time, then there's Raid mode, which is just some good old fashioned zombie slaughtering fun. Plus you unlock stuff, there are hidden things, etc. so some replay value is bundled in as well.

Online seems dead, but what can you expect 2 years after release...

This has to be an experiment to see if a game can be as just as annoying or more annoying than it is fun. Everything it has going for it is matched by some downside. Here we go:

It looks pretty good - even by today's standards for a little top-down game the environments and explosions are lush. If they had dynamic lighting it would look amazing. But it introduces these good looking environments with unskippable cutscenes (I mean the in-engine ones, thankfully you can skip the comic ones). In an arcade game. What?

You have several characters to pick from with different abilities and upgrade paths, nice. But they have zero personality and you have to deal with a hyper annoying gung-ho order-barking boss that I really wish could be silenced.

The core game mechanics are pretty tight - drive your little vehicle, shoot things, get better guns, shoot things some more, sometimes change to some other vehicle, shoot even more things. That's good in small doses... but this game basically keeps on stacking more and more and more on top of a level. It all takes forever to finish (seriously, it feels like a level goes on for an hour or so, even if it doesn't really) and if you don't succeed you'll start all over again.

Well, that was the good stuff... what else is annoying - random falling damage - who knows if you'll survive this jump? Your vehicle clips on things or flips over quite easily. Once again - your idiot boss has just one answer to all of life's problems - blow it up - and he'll use every single chance to yell it out to you. Achievements are once again more annoying than interesting, forcing you to juggle tasks within the timed missions. There's more, but this is already long.

So why recommend it? Well, if you like this sort of game there aren't many options on PC. It does look good, things do blow up quite nicely and you do power things up so the missions start to flow a little faster. If you are ready to grit your teeth a good deal give it a try.

Bullseye!*

If you like this sort of game (although there are not too many fine examples on PC) then this is certainly worth a go. The combat is quite satisfying (and does certain things quite differently from other games), the story is rather ridiculous, but entertaining and the PC port is well done. A gamepad is certainly recommended.
If there is one thing that may mar the early gameplay it is lack of information as the parry/evade/Blade mode systems in this game are quite crucial to survival and progress, yet barely get explained (just a quick prompt for a few seconds and that’s it. Due to this the first real boss battle becomes way more challenging than it should be. After dying about 7 times I started getting the hang of the parry mechanic and managed to progress, after which the game became way more fun. After having a look online turned out plenty of people had a similar experience. So here are some tips that might help enjoy the game (Let’s assume gamepad controls):

• RB locks onto enemies.
• Blade mode (LT) lets you not only slice and dice enemies, but also rip out their organs for healing. When an enemy is ripe and ready they get a yellow hieroglyph icon and then when you engage blade mode and align your slices with the red square a prompt will pop up to press B and de-organ an enemy (yum!)
• Also: This may not be apparent right away, but a slight blue tint on the screen and a large white hieroglyph is a prompt to engage Blade mode to avoid otherwise inescapable attacks.
• Parrying in this game works by moving the left stick towards the attack (when a red crosshair glows over the enemy weapon) and pressing the X (light attack) button.
• If an enemy does a charge attack (when they get a golden glow) a block won’t work and the only way is to evade – by pressing A+X (jump and light attack) at the same time at the right time.
As said before once you master this the enjoyment of the game just goes up and up as you get more weapons and abilities and face every crazier enemies. Certainly recommended.

*Raiden yells this when successfully ripping out some organs from an enemy to feast on which is quite satisfying, I must admit.

Closest thing to (Do)Donpachi you can get on a PC without emulation. Which basically means this is some fine frantic shmup action. Nerves of steel and good reflexes recommended.

Most fun game of 2011, hands down.

Must play. One of the best games of 2011, finished the campaign twice, might do it again.