Recent reviews by Skitch

I'm not sure what the developers were thinking not delaying this game again. Probably should have delayed it a full year at least. The game has minimal polish and many half baked ideas. I've been trying to give the game a fair shake, since I loved The Forest so much, and it's been pretty frustrating.

* The GPS system is interesting, but not fleshed out. You can't even choose custom markers when placing a GPS tag, it just resets back to a radio icon.
* The audio mixing for me has been pretty bad. Streams are deafening.
* There's zero point in building a base. It's already pretty high effort compared to the original, but then they also removed water catchers, gave no penalty to eating raw meat (so no point cooking), no raids or anything so no reason to rush back to base to defend against enemies. Also there's no gates, so the only way to get into your base is via rope, but that breaks the companion AI.
* The vast majority of the island is empty. It's larger than the original but with the same amount of landmarks and "real" caves. This leads to so much time being burned just running around the forest trying to get from point A to point B.
* Why are there tiny pointless caves? I get geared up, save the game, then muster the courage to enter a cave. And then it's a single empty room? Was I just supposed to feel disappointment?
* No hotkeys, but opening the inventory freezes time. So really no danger to just opening your inventory mid-battle and munching on some energy bars, crafting more arrows, and switching weapons. Just way more time consuming and annoying.
* No rafts or house boats? sad.
* No feeling of good character progression. Strength system is a bit esoteric, and no stick or rock bags from hunting and crafting.
* Weather and season system seems good, but extremely unpolished. No rain effects on certain items, animations cause clipping through the snow, items can be dropped through solid ice with a splash. Also extremely jarring effect between running water and a frozen lake.
* Enemy AI is exactly the same as the first game. Random running around in circles and getting stuck facing walls. More egregious is when the cannibals break into my base and get stuck on my stick or rock holders.
* Lore tidbits are laughable. Why is a dead golf player clutching a printed out email saying they forgot their clubs?
* The caves are extremely difficult if you fight your way through them. However, if you just run to the end you can avoid taking any damage. Once you realize that it's pretty boring and hard to actually force yourself to do any fighting.

I'll update this review with my thoughts on the story once I finish it.

UPDATE:
Wow that was bad. Like I'm not sure how they'll be able to salvage it bad. Zero payoff, you spend so much time fighting and then it just ends with a 2 minute cutscene that feels completely detached from the rest of the game and doesn't really mean anything. Credits roll, and then title screen.

I played so many hours because I really wanted to see everything new they tried. Just kind of sad now.

A game that surpasses the original in every way. Superb visuals and voice acting from Isaac, and plenty of extra content compared to the original. Really enjoyed the introduction of the side quests and security clearances, giving me a reason to go back and explore old parts of the Ishimura. I also like that not all the enemy encounters are scripted, they did a good job of knowing when to raise the tension through having enemies randomly attack. An extremely spooky game that is also excellent scifi. Love the weapons too and power progression, each time I play through I feel like the journey is just fun and exciting.

A vastly improved Dwarf Fortress experience. While some of the menus do require a bit too much mouse clicking at times, the overall UX of the game is much improved. The tutorial was a boon too, it did a good job of showing the extreme basics of the game and the general 'feel' of it. I think the rough edges have been smoothed enough now that an interested newcomer can definitely have a good time with it.

It's still definitely one of the best management games I have played. The sheer amount of systems that are simulated is astounding and they all manage to work together expertly. You never know what the coming seasons will throw at you, but the fun of the game is seeing just how long your fortress can last and what finally takes it down. This will be a game I keep coming back to over the years.

Has a solid mixture of dungeon crawling and colony management. The art style and music is also very good, it's easy to just want to sit back and enjoy watching the colony. There doesn't seem like there will be much replayability, but the ride so far has been really enjoyable.

Tunic is an adventurous mix of Zelda, Dark Souls, and maybe even a bit of Outer Wilds. I've had a blast beating the first boss. It is definitely a bit tough, but the environmental storytelling and 'hidden in plain sight' secrets really hit the spot. Definitely looking forward to getting through this adventure. It also has gorgeous environments and clean animations which is a major plus.

I hadn't played Skyrim in years so this edition felt like a breath of fresh air. I'm playing with the Anniversary DLC and it's been nice seeing things I had never seen before. Survival mode definitely makes the game more enjoyable to play too, I actually care about my horse and which holds have carriages due to the lack of fast travel. It also makes the game a bit better to roleplay with since you'll need to sleep, eat, and avoid the cold in order to avoid debuffs to magika, stamina, and health respectively. Definitely recommend this version of the game for people looking to do a replay after a very long time.

This is peak Halo multiplayer. The guns also feel completely awesome, was sold the second I started using the pistol. I've only been playing Big Team Battle but it definitely takes me back to what I felt like was the golden age of Halo. Not many customization options, but at the end of the day all that matters is how fun to play it is, and it's definitely a lot of fun

This is a great game to unwind with. The environments are a low-poly art style that just comes out looking really nice. The controls are pretty intuitive too, you can either fly around, teleport where you want, or press the trigger to teleport to the perfect spot by your ball for a putt. The game has some great courses too and it can be fun to try to find the hidden golf balls that you can add to your collection. Definitely recommend if you enjoy laid back mini golf.

Barotrauma is a fun and hectic multiplayer game. It felt awesome running around frantically as deep sea critters tried to break their way into our sub. The game mechanics themselves are also pretty polished and it feels good playing. I never played public servers, but playing in my own lobbies we all had a lot of fun getting to the end of the campaign. I hope they can add a lot more critters though, about halfway through the campaign I felt like I had already seen everything so then it was just doing the same kind of missions over and over to get to the end. It was also tough to strike a balance between too easy and boring, and too hard and frustrating. On the whole it was a good experience but when everything is going well it can be pretty boring just going from point A to point B. I hope they can figure out something for the crew to be doing that's not so boring (breaking down and crafting items was pretty boring). But the destinations were always fun to explore and conquer!

This game has a great core. If you want to role play as Mark Watney, this is by far the best game for it. Every increment, like adding an airlock, planting my first potato, smelting steel, felt like a great achievement. The controls are a bit cumbersome but I felt like that made the game even more 'realistic'. The only downside is really the lack of polish on this title, especially in regards to multiplayer. I had a great time doing coop with this game but there were a large amount of bugs related to synchronization. Many times I would see a working airlock console while someone else would see just 'ERROR'. A quick restart would fix the issues, but it was still annoying. We also had to rely on the external wiki basically entirely, the in-game wiki was only useful for crafting recipes basically but gave no real information on specifications or how-to tips.

Still a great experience though, just hope before it leaves Early Access they focus on polish!