Recent reviews by I/Orb

At one point, the frame rate was so low that the fps counter disappeared. My performance literally went from fps to spf.

Pros:
+Great soundtrack
+Map changes as you progress through the game
+Simple controls
+Nice art style
+Huge map
+Immersive Marathon-esque storytelling (you get bits and pieces of the story via computers around the map)

Cons:
-Num keys can't be used due to engine limitations
-The graphics are so low res, that it can be hard to see certain things

This game is very well-made, considering it was developed by only 2 people. I recommend this, especially to metroidvania fans.

Pros:
-It's very optimized. When the game was still in Early Access, the performance was often pretty terrible. It would jump around from decent to god-awful. Now, it's actually playable. The optimization was my biggest issue with the game during its Early Access period, which is why I'm happy at the fact that it's fine.

-The graphics are great. I think most people don't really expect much out of the Unity engine, but games like this and Escape From Tarkov show what it's capable of. The textures look really good accross the board. The particle effects could look better, but that's a nitpick. I was surprised at the quality of the textures when I played on medium settings. I expected them to look much worse than the highest settings.

-The gameplay is satisfying and immersive. The guns kill usually kill in between 1 or 2 shots, making gunfights very intense. Explosives have a wide blast radius, so they're pretty fearsome, especially since most of Verdun's maps are composed of cramped areas. The gas mask impairs your vision, which makes fighting in a cloud of poisonous gas, which is already impossible to see through, even more challenging. The camera moves and loses color whenever an enemy just misses a shot on you. It really drives the feeling that you almost got killed.

-The sound design is great. The guns feeling powerful is due in part to how strong they sound whenever you shoot. I've heard that the guns' real life counterparts were actually recorded for the shooting sounds. Explosions also sound nice, but the agonizing screaming of injured soldiers really carry the atmosphere. It's like you're actually trying to hold down trenches in World War 1.

-Teamwork is emphasized with the squad system. Frontlines is the go-to game mode, and you need to join a squad in order to play it. The squads can hold 4 players; each with a specific role. This pushes you to work with other players.

Cons:
-It can be kinda hard to tell your teammates apart from your enemies, because of how similar their uniforms may look. Confusing an enemy with an ally is a great way to get killed, especially in a game where that can happen instantly.

Multiplayer survival games are kind of a guilty pleasure of mine. On paper, they're bad. I mean, you could lose hours upon hours of progress the moment someone kills you, and they can make off with all of your loot. To most people, that's not very fun, and that's completely understandable. Nobody enjoys being forced to start over from the beginning, but strangely enough, that's exactly part of what makes multiplayer survival games so enjoyable. The simple fact that you could lose everything makes the games very intense. You don't have any sense of security that other games may give you. This forces you to play smart, and actually take the games seriously. The fun isn't in losing your stuff, it's in doing everything in your power to stay alive, hence why they're called SURVIVAL games. Miscreated is a multiplayer survival game I've been dying to get, and I finally got to put in a couple hours, so here are my first impressions.

Pros:
-The graphics are really good. CryEngine is known for its high level of detail. This is reflected in Miscreated very well. Textures look great, even if you're not on high settings. The lighting effects, weather effects, and flora look great, and add to the atmosphere of the game.

-It's well optimized, for what it is. I honestly didn't think a game with graphics this good would run so well, especially since I've had issues running every other multiplayer survival game I own. The fact that it's still in its alpha phase says a lot.

-The UI is simple. There's no cluttering; there are different sections, with different amounts of item slots. You can also access other menus right from the inventory. The HUD and pause menus are also simple, and accessible. The UI's nothing special, but it works well.

-The map is decently sized.

-There are lots of weapons.

-Looting is easy, and fast. You just find stuff lying around, and pick it up. You don't have to wait for a UI to pop up, and move things around.

Cons:
-The melee combat is just bad. Sometimes it's hard to hit enemies, because they have to pretty much be directly in front of you while you're attacking. It doesn't help that the animations are slower than the attacks of basic enemy AI.

-There's no easy way to play with friends. There's no party system or dedicated servers, so you'll have to join a public server, look for each other, and hope that neither of you die on the way.

-It's very easy to get lost. Remember when I said that the textures are great? Yes, the textures look nice, but many of them get reused, as well as layouts for structures. Not only that, but if you want an in-game map, you'll have to find it. This makes navigating a pain in the ass. I've found myself running around in circles, without even realizing it. It gets annoying fast.

-It takes forever to get from Point A to Point B. Seriously, the running speed is slow. There are vehicles, but they're hard as hell to find, and from what I've seen, very frail. I'm pretty sure at least half of my play time was spent on running around.

-Loot is really unforgiving. Okay, I get that it's supposed to be hardcore, but come on. Even on servers that aren't very populated, finding good loot can be pretty time-consuming. Finding a gun with no ammo is pretty frustrating, especially when you run into more experienced players, who have better gear than you. You're gonna die, a lot.

-The guns sound kinda weak. From what I've heard in gameplay videos, and listened to in-game, the guns do sound wimpy. I think the devs should record some actual guns, and use those sounds instead.

-The loot system may be convenient, but it's not perfect. It doesn't take very long to loot, but the placement of some items might make them hard to see. Not only that, but there are a bunch of closed shelves and what-not in the game. Why not just use the searching system on those? It's used on other players and enemies, but not on anything else, which I find weird.

-The mechanic for loading/reloading guns is clunky. Instead of just hitting "R" like most shooters, you have to actually go into your inventory, click and drag the ammo into your gun's ammo slot, and get out of the inventory. Try doing that under pressure.

-The hitboxes seem to be messed up. This one guy was punching me, but on my end, it didn't even look like his punches reached me.

-The FOV in first person mode is too low. It'd be nice if I could see more of the screen, without having to mess up the immersion by zooming out into third person mode.

The game is still in early access, and has made a lot of progress, from what I've heard. I did enjoy the game, but the negative aspects do take away a lot from the experience. Getting lost is not fun. Always finding loot you don't need isn't fun. Getting killed because you couldn't find ammo for your empty gun isn't fun. Getting beat to death because of hit-or-miss hit detection and awkward animations is not fun. It's like the developers tried so hard to make this game hardcore, that they forgot that games are about enjoyment first and foremost. Don't hold my hand, but don't chop off it and make me look for it, either. I can forgive this game, because it's in Early Access, and better than most other survival games, imo. There's fun to be had, just be prepared to deal with frustration. Hopefully, the devs will see this review, and listen to what I have to say. This game has a LONG way to go, before it's completed.

I'm a big fan of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games, so when I heard about Survarium, I was really hyped up. The fact that devs from the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series are working on this only added to that. I thought that it would be an open-world MMO, in other words, a way to get my S.T.A.L.K.E.R. fix, after the one which was supposed to come out was canceled. Vostok even put "MMO" in the tags. As it turns out, the MMO portion(free play) of the game wasn't even in development, so that was kind of a disappointment, especially since the game was pretty busted for a while.

Pros:
For what it's worth, it's currently not a bad game. The graphics look amazing. There's a noticeable attention to detail on the environments, and the anomalies are nice pieces of eye-candy. Also, the guns look pretty close to their real life counterparts. There's no noticeable clipping on the various armor pieces you can equip either. Whatever engine this game runs on is great, in the looks department.

The skill system is really in-depth. You have one for guns, one for physical activities, and one for anomalies. Every skill tree has an assortment of skills to spec into. Now, if only you got more than one skill point every time you leveled up.

From what I remember, the music and sound design really drive the atmosphere home. The guns pack a punch, and you can hear it. Even small pistols sound impactful. Explosions are expectedly powerful. Sound effects are different indoors and outdoors, which is nice. The music is what you'd expect from a post-apocalyptic game: Dark, dreary and depressing. It works very well.

The business model is fair, but grindy. People are usually very quick to label an f2p game as "pay-to-win", which while understandable, isn't very fair. You can buy most things with the in-game currency. Attachments are obtained through kills, and upgrades require both in-game currency and scrap metal; both are obtained by completing matches. You earn a decent amount of the in-game currency every match, but only a small amount of scrap metal. This is a problem, because upgrades have a 50% chance to succeed with the in-game currency. If you fail to upgrade, now you have to go and play some more matches, and your odds don't get any better. I remember trying to upgrade one of my guns, and failing, gathering up enough to upgrade again, and failing again. It can get frustrating, especially with high-tier guns, which require a whole lot of currency and scrap metal per upgrade.

The new UI is pretty, and didn't take much getting used to. Not really much for me to say about it, to be honest.

Cons:
The matchmaking was always pretty bad. You would normally find yourself waiting a while, and having to play against players with way better gear than you. The stash maps helped, but they can't fix a lack of players. Now, instead of fighting players, you're mostly fighting bots. Not only that, but you could wind up waiting 2 minutes+ with all the regions and game modes checked. I wind up playing on foreign servers, too, so my ping is almost always above 100. It's pretty annoying.

Friendly fire shouldn't be a thing in this game, in my opinion. It's frustrating to be in the middle of a firefight, just for some random teammate to get in your way. Also, I've heard of cases of intentional friendly-fire too.

There aren't that many maps. I get that it's a small team on a tight budget, with a free-to-play game, but playing on the same few maps gets boring, especially when you do it for as long as I did.

The anomalies get under my skin. They tend to spawn in important areas, like exits in your spawn points, making getting around maps inconvenient. if you get near them, without good gear for that, you'll take tons of damage. Also, last time I checked, most of the artifacts within these anomalies aren't even that useful.

Game updates are annoying, if you don't start up the launcher every time one is released. If you take some time off of the game, and launch it, you'll have to wait for every update to install, one by one. I'd prefer it if the game updated through steam, and gave you all the content in one download.

Bleeding has almost been removed from the game entirely. Back then, it only took a few shots to initiate a bleed-out effect. Now, you could shoot somebody a bunch of times and they would lose not one drop of blood.

Conclusion:
It went from a product that shouldn't have been in the public eye, to an above-average f2p fps game with rpg and survival elements. The biggest issue I have is the fact that we don't know what's going on with free-play past the announcement they put out a while ago. Free play was the only reason most people even got into Survarium in the first place. The community's slowly dying out, because the community's getting tired of waiting. Every match I join is filled with bots. Vostok took too long to make Survarium a decent game, and are suffering for it. It's much better than it used to be, but the development is progressing at a snail's pace. I think the game has potential, but will Vostok Games be able to keep up with the development costs?

Sidenote: I hope Vostok sees this and listens. I've been hearing a lot about them suppressing criticism, recently.

Hylics is a strange turn-based RPG. Nothing really makes sense in this game, but it still works, somehow.

Pros:
-The art style is interesting
-The game has a good sense of humor
-The gameplay is enjoyable
-The music is good, and fits the weird art style
-There are no random battles

Cons:
-The game is too easy
-The game is short
-There isn't much of a story
-Most of the dialogue is nonsensical

In conclusion, it's a fun game that's dirt cheap. It's short, but you shouldn't expect much for $2.99.

Pros:
-Better graphics
-Same good story
-Stealth works
-Same interesting characters
-Better optimized
-Survivor and Spartan modes
-Not having to buy the same gun, for its attachments

Nitpicks:
-The notes you find are all Artyom's notes, which doesn't make much sense
-The Nosalises don't look as scary
-Some textures don't look better than the original

Cons
-Still not optimized that well
-Isn't as atmospheric as the original

If you own the original, I wouldn't recommend buying this at full price. Regardless, it's still worth purchasing.

Pros:
-The voice acting is good
-The music is great
-The story's decent
-The game's challenging
-Enemies are varied
-The tactical portion of the gameplay is well executed, for the most part
-The DC-17m(default primary weapon) is badass

Nitpicks:
-Using bumpmapping on high will most likely cause issues(can be fixed with a mod, but installing it will render you unable to play online with anyone who doesn't have the mod)
-No widescreen support(can be fixed)
-Some enemies are really cheap
-The graphics show their age

Cons:
-The DC-17m feels weak, in its base form
-Multiplayer's an afterthought
-The sights on the DC-17m are hard to use
-The crosshair makes hipfiring awkward
-The friendly AI isn't too great, and tends to fail against higher-tier enemies

This game is pretty much Star Wars and Rainbow Six: Vegas crammed into one game. It's fun, albeit annoying, sometimes. The game doesn't look like much, by today's standards, but it's good for its time. If you're a Star Wars fan, or are into shooters, I think you should check this out.

Pros:
-Good graphics
-Many maps
-Plenty of guns
-Runs very well, considering the graphics engine
-Diverse classes
-Multiple game modes
-Is free to play/has a fair business model
-Cool customization

Cons:
-Some of the maps share one bad design(2 static spawn points; 1 or more chokepoints within the small space in between)
-The sniper rifles are game-breakingly overpowered
-95% of the guns are locked until you reach level 9
-The amount of money you earn per game is inconsistent

Nitpicks:
-Some guns that should have a really high rate of fire, are at less than 800rpm
-PhysX is badly optimized

Levels 1-8: Fun, but there's like one other gun that isn't locked until level 9, and it has godawful accuracy
Level 9+: Hackers, campers, overpowered guns, and frustration

Don't get me wrong, I still think the game is good, and still recommend it, but be prepared to rage after getting to level 9. I've earned over 200 Warface dollars with 10 kills in one match, yet only earn like 64 in my most recent match, with 10 kills. It's really annoying; especially when you have to pay to repair your equipment, and getting new guns is a grind, if you want them permanently. It doesn't help that everybody has a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ hard-on for sniper rifles when you get past level 9. You could should shoot someone's foot, and get a kill. The fact that they're even useful in close quarters, is such a travesty. Let's not even get started on the semi-automatic sniper rifles. Those are just all the butthurt in the world, formed into a gun. They're the king of overpowered weaponry.

Pros:
-Has what could be the most likeable main character in the Crysis series
-Runs better than Crysis, or so I've heard
-Crysis Wars has much better multiplayer than Crysis (still playable, if you use mods, btw)
-Apparently looks better than the powerhouse Crysis still is
-Is a good challenge

Cons:
-The performance, while improved, will still make your pc struggle at max settings
-Has a short story mode
-Wars lost a lot of its community since 2008

Psycho (the protagonist) is so great, that he makes the story, which is pretty much the same as Crysis', more interesting. I never actually played Wars, but from what I've seen, it's pretty much a futuristic BF2, with better graphics, and nanosuits. AWESOME. The single player's short, but tough. You'll most likely enjoy the multiplayer, but check out the multiplayer guide, so you can play it. Buy this game, along with Crysis, in the Crysis Maximum Edition pack. Seriously, buy this, and Crysis. Wars comes with Warhead.