Recent reviews by Runamoine

Boldly answers the question, "What if Fallout 3 was good?"

Review stays negative til it goes back on sale in the countries it was delisted in

I looked up and an hour had passed

Normally I list out pros and cons for reviews, but in this case I feel that's not really necessary. Really the only 2 things I have to say are:

-In terms of craftsmanship this game absolutely lives up the hype. The writing, the voice acting, the art, the music, all of it.
-This game is about as close to playing D&D as you're going to get in video game form. That extends to player engagement; if you don't explore, talk to NPCs, experiment with character builds and party composition, your experience will be less than it could be. If you think of an seemingly unconventional solution to something the game throws at you, give it a shot! It'll work more often than you think.

The good:
-enemies explode into wet messes and most weapons have a real punch to them, keeping combat engaging
-fast paced combat you've come to expect from boomer shooters
-great art direction, especially the weapon sprites
-you have the option to make enemies 2D sprites or voxels
-overall great sound design
-Andrew Hulshult OST

The bad:
-will almost certainly require repeating some levels to get all the ore
-almost all enemies and weapons have a 1:1 counterpart in DOOM or Quake
-I get lost a lot because I'm dumb
-Multiplayer is dead (not the dev's fault but still a bummer)

If you have even a passing interest in retro FPS this is a must play

What can I even say? Not the first FPS, but the most influential by a mile.

The good:
-addictive gameplay loop
-highly customizable difficulty
-great sound design
-lots of secrets and challenges to complete to give you something to play towards
-WAY more lore than one might expect at first glance
-gives the dopamine hit of 'number go up' while keeping you engaged with builds, items, secrets, etc.

The bad:
-can get stale once you've started upgrading character/global stats unless you modify to make more difficult
-the trial and error to figure out certain secrets/combinations can get frustrating if you don't want to look them up, especially if you get to a point where you're more likely to make it to the 30 minute mark than not

what else is there to say? This game launched the bullet heaven craze of the last few years and at $5 it's an easy recommend.

Let's start with what's actually good here:
-OST
-Atmosphere! Arguably the strongest point of the game, especially combined with the music. It can be nice to just walk around and look at a setting that has held up shockingly well for its age.
-more mods than I know what to do with (I guess they're paid now? ♥♥♥♥ that)

Now for the bad*:
-combat feels stiff and unsatisfying, even the unique death animations wear out their welcome pretty quick
-despite being the flagship feature, dragons are pretty poorly implemented and aren't all that exciting to fight IMO
-frequently rewards the player for breaking immersion (be real, you didn't naturally progress your blacksmithing skill, you made 500 iron daggers in a row and were suddenly a master)
-RPG elements have regressed from Oblivion, which was itself a regression from Morrowind in this regard
-allowing the player to become faction leader of all factions (with the exception of whichever civil war side you don't choose) in a few in-game days cheapens all of them (the mage's guild in particular stands out here, you can put the bare minimum into spellcasting and get to be archmage in an in-game week)
-main quest is forgettable nonsense

*most of these can be addressed with mods. The above criticism is directed strictly at the base game.

Let's start with what's actually good here:
-OST
-Atmosphere! Arguably the strongest point of the game, especially combined with the music. It can be nice to just walk around and look at a setting that has held up shockingly well for its age.
-more mods than I know what to do with (I guess they're paid now? ♥♥♥♥ that)

Now for the bad*:
-combat feels stiff and unsatisfying, even the unique death animations wear out their welcome pretty quick
-despite being the flagship feature, dragons are pretty poorly implemented and aren't all that exciting to fight IMO
-frequently rewards the player for breaking immersion (be real, you didn't naturally progress your blacksmithing skill, you made 500 iron daggers in a row and were suddenly a master)
-RPG elements have regressed from Oblivion, which was itself a regression from Morrowind in this regard
-allowing the player to become faction leader of all factions (with the exception of whichever civil war side you don't choose) in a few in-game days cheapens all of them (the mage's guild in particular stands out here, you can put the bare minimum into spellcasting and get to be archmage in an in-game week)
-main quest is forgettable nonsense


*most of these can be addressed with mods. The above criticism is directed strictly at the base game.

This game is objectively bad in a lot of ways:
-forgettable main quest
-braindead AI
-massive retcon of the setting (LotR had come out recently around its release and suddenly Cyrodil is no longer a jungle as previous games had mentioned)
-clunky combat, especially spellcasting (♥♥♥♥ you if you wanna have more than 1 spell at the ready, right? Just kidding, you're gonna be a stealth archer anyway)
-character models have aged terribly and look like wood carvings of people
-byzantine menus

So why the recommendation?
-Oblivion is the all time champ for most unintentionally entertaining games. Just watching the aforementioned AI spiral into absolute chaos from something unremarkable or get locked into surreal conversations with each other still makes me laugh.
-I'm a sucker for a good OST
-I love the look of the menus and UI, even if they're arranged poorly.

If you catch it on sale, you will absolutely get $5-10 worth of entertainment.