Recent reviews by cdg

Bought the game for the Acceleracers Expansion to relive my childhood dreams of racing in the realms – got a lot more than I expected out of it. Great game! It's got the tried and tested formula of easy to learn, but hard to master. The tracks and environments are very well designed, and the sheer variety of cars are just impressive to see realized on a game less than 20gb!

The best way to describe Gaiden is that it's a greatest-hits compilation celebrating Kiryu Kazuma, the Dragon of Dojima.

While it's a rather short game, only comprising 5 chapters – it's a fun little jaunt that put you back into his shoes and reminds you just how great of a character Kiryu is. I personally think that this game respects Kiryu more than Y6, and truly has a sense of finality – which is funny given how Kiryu is present in the upcoming LAD: Infinite Wealth. Great callbacks, with Takaya Kuroda's incredible voice acting really showcasing just how much Kiryu has changed over the past 7 games.

Combat-wise, it's not as great as Lost Judgment. I'd put it slightly above the first Judgment, but it's still fun to beat up random dudes. This game shines in it's side-content, where I've spent majority of my playtime doing. That's not something I usually do in a Yakuza title, as I greatly enjoy the story content more, but Gaiden incentivizes you greatly for checking off that list, and I couldn't help but continuously support the Akame Network.

I'd rate it a solid 8/10. My only downside would be the humungous file size. I hope RGG puts out a patch to reduce the storage taken up by the Cabaret Club FMVs, and also consider making the LAD8 demo a separate download / DLC install. 98GB is too much space for a 15-30 hour bite-sized Like a Dragon game. I'm certain that Infinite Wealth will be much smaller than this when it comes out in January.

An absolute delight! Played this with my girlfriend and we had a great time discovering the mysteries abound on the Haunted Island. It's about an hour long, but it's very charming and well-written. Can't wait to jump into the rest of the Frog Detective series!

Not exactly the best bundle for value, but if you like more nostalgic cosmetic in the form of armor inspired by Marathon and Halo, then go get this one.

Two great dungeons included here, Shattered Throne and Grasp of Avarice. Includes the Last Wish raid, which isn't tuned to modern health standards but is plenty of fun still. You also get a Gjallarhorn from this pack, but I wouldn't recommend to get this pack unless it's on sale.

Great bundle comprising of Shadowkeep, Beyond Light, and Witch Queen.

Shadowkeep has a pretty short campaign, but makes up for it in the excellent post-campaign adventure with Eris Morn and her coming to terms with the death of her fireteam. It includes the Garden of Salvation Raid, which contains one of the most gorgeous endgame destinations in the series, and a whole slew of new and reprised exotics. Activities include Nightmare Hunts.. which are okay, Altars of Sorrow, and a thrilling dungeon in the form of Pit of Heresy.

Beyond Light has a fun campaign that makes great use of new weather technology that really creates a hostile environment on Europa. It's cool to find yourself wandering into the blizzard only to run into an Eliksni patrol crew and an unmanned Fallen Brig out to get you. Stasis is the first darkness subclass introduced in the series, and while it's not my personal favorite – it's perfect for ad-clear and freezing enemies in place. Lots of post-campaign goodness here, going into the deep backstories of the Exo Stranger and the Bray Family. Some really really crazy stuff is revealed here, and the proper introduction of Clovis Bray makes for a perfect antagonist in the Deep Stone Crypt Raid. In 2023, Beyond Light now includes access to Presage, a Dead Space-like exotic quest that gives you access to the sick western scout rifle, Dead Man's Tale.

The Witch Queen has the best campaign in Destiny history so far, with a compelling antagonist in the form of Savathûn. It's got a truly difficult campaign experience complete with puzzles, mini-boss encounters, and surprising revelations evoking memories of Bungie's all-time greats. The raid, Vow of the Disciple, takes this to a new level – pitting you against a terrifying new foe inside a broken-down Pyramid Ship. Lots of things to chase and do here, like weapon crafting and the exotic missions Vox Obscura and Seraph Shield, but this unfortunately does not include the Witch Queen Dungeon Key.

It's not a perfect expansion, but I really enjoyed what it brought to the table.

Lightfall has a solid campaign with incredibly fun gameplay moments. While not as mechanically complex as the previous expansion, the Witch Queen – Lightfall is more so focused on attempting to fulfill the city-under-siege fantasy, and I'd say that it works for most of it. The introduction of the Tormentors as the new enemy type create exciting moments in the campaign, where the threat of them grabbing you, charging at you, or suppressing your abilities keeps you alert. I love how aggressive they're tuned!

Speaking of Neomuna, the new destination is gorgeous and greatly reminds me of New Mombasa from Bungie's previous title, Halo 3: ODST. It's mostly empty, which is to be expected from a Destiny planet – but it's pretty cool in terms of the post-game lore quests. Lots of interesting things are discussed in flavor text, lore tabs, and even spoken audio logs. It does feel like an evolution of ODST, and yet I wish that more of it was made accessible. It's pretty, don't get me wrong, but I feel like they could've pushed the concept harder.

The new subclass, Strand, helped inject new life into the game, and you can't deny it's terribly fun to grapple onto your friends' Sparrow and ride around Neomuna. I adore the Broodweaver super for the Warlock, and creating threadlings in the heat of battle has saved my ass more times than I can count. Suspend grenades are great for high-level content and Crucible too.

I can't speak on the Raid, as I haven't been able to gather a team for it yet.

Narratively, Lightfall is uneven. Whilst I greatly enjoyed the gameplay, the narrative leaves a lot to be desired. While I don't necessarily have a problem with the filler-aspect of the story, a lot of it could be fixed by simply explaining our motivation for reaching the Veil. We know why we need to stop Calus and the Witness, they're going to do some crazy stuff. But locking the Veil's explanation behind weekly audio log (which is great, don't get me wrong – really good story stuff there) accessible after you beat some post-campaign quests is not the best way to deliver content to your audience.

I understand what Bungie was trying to do with establishing urgency, but that sense of urgency completely disappears when you spend most of it learning about your mysterious cool new powers. There are genuinely great character moments for the now-mortal Osiris, and Nimbus in the post-campaign quest for Deterministic Chaos, but unfortunately the main story is a dud.

That being said, as disappointing as the main story is, it's not as meandering as Beyond Light or Shadowkeep. It's more or less on par with them. Those expansions also include campaigns that are not the best, but pack a huge punch with the post-campaign questlines.

If you're still reading, it's definitely worth a pick-up on sale. It's still going to give you hours of fun and a ton of secrets to discover.

It really makes you feel like you're in a martial arts film. Sifu's strength is in it's rogue-like nature, wherein after a defeat, an older version of your character returns to finish the fight. Learning patterns and striking when appropriate is addictive, and the "one more turn" aspect it presents truly elevates the game from a tribute to martial arts flicks to a beast of it's own.

Very enjoyable romp in the greater Marvel universe. Guardians is rife with excellent character writing and inspired music choices, making up for it's serviceable combat. Can't wait to play more.

Great side-game set in the Arkham universe.

Roger Craig-Smith does a good job of embodying a younger, more brutal Batman, and the fantasy of being Batman is greatly assisted by the addition of fast travel and an actual Batcave for once.

The story is what you'd expect from an Arkham game, with fun detective moments and surprisingly inventive boss fights, but the combat seems to have lost it's flow when compared to Arkham City. Traversal takes a hit too, often times necessitating the need to use fast travel because of how the map is set up. Gliding does not feel as good as previous games.

An excellent school-management simulator.

I've been following this since it's announcement last year, and the developers are really great in terms of taking feedback and listening to the community. For starters, the tutorial is a lot more structured and truly eases you into the game. Lots of UI elements were tweaked with the help of the community, and in general the game is a lot more easier to understand with all the complex systems it throws at you.

For a lot of players, the aesthetic of the game is a strong reason to try it out. It's super charming, and it translates in wanting to create a cute school that you want to just care and nurture. I'd highly recommend checking out the demo release of the game if you're interested, but honestly support these devs by buying the full game because they've certainly made a product that deserves attention.