Recent reviews by The King in the North

I think even in like 2020 this would've been a banger. Sadly feels totally archaic to play at this point, multiple generations of game tech later. Limited settings customization, sloppy visuals, extremely simple and broken AI. Enemies are so exploitable if you've ever like, played any video games, that immersion is pretty much out of the question. There's very little stopping you from just sprinting around instakilling everything from deer to humans to big cats to cave bears with very little resistance on the hardest difficulty with base weapons. I didn't try the survival mode that people seem to hold in high regard, so perhaps the game is more engaging that way. But for that kind of time dedication you're better off playing something that feels like it's from this decade. And that's not even a dig at this game - it's literally not from the current decade. And it REALLY shows. Long gone are the days of good-faith AAA video game development. There's a reason there was a new Far Cry every year for like, ten years or whatever. Planned obsolescence is a disgusting thing.

With all that said, the original Far Cry gameplay loop IS fun, so if you're running a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ rig or you're someone who likes to pretend graphics/functionality are irrelevant and you need something faux open-world to ♥♥♥♥ around in for a couple dozen hours, I can see Primal filling that kind of role. I tried the "Apex edition" (...) on sale for 9 USD, and that's definitely worth it, despite my refund. Again, I just can't imagine spending a ton of time on such a dated and janky game when there are so many options out there. And giving Ubisoft money never, EVER, under virtually any circumstances, feels remotely justifiable. Speaking of those jackasses, this game forces you to install "Ubisoft Connect" (who knows wtf that even is) in order to play. Need I say any more...?

Wanted to wait until 1000 hours to write anything, though admittedly I knew for the last ~500 where this was going to end up. I LOVE this game at its core. The actual game loop, the gamePLAY - wonderful stuff. Would literally never get old IF the matchmaking were...different(?) Stop me if you've heard this one before...

To preface this, I want to address the point delusional EA worshipers constantly throw back at my particular critique, before anyone even says it this time: Not everyone has the will, let alone desire, to browse Reddit forums in an effort to find similarly skilled randoms to play with in order to simulate a balanced matchmaking system. People on the internet are weird + I'm not a social butterfly. Sifting through all that ♥♥♥♥ is not for me and I don't think that's a reasonable expectation to have of your playerbase.

What I WANT to do is play with my actual friends, who have historically been willing, to their credit, to endure many sessions with me. Those sessions typically involve(d) them being instantly one-clipped to start an engagement by players they NEVER should've been facing in pubs, let alone ranked, and leaving me to attempt to 1v2/3, again, MOST of the time. I'm historically a 2-ish KD player at my best; I'm solid at the game, but I'm simply not capable of consistently beating Master and Predator-tier 3-stacks who populate our lobbies, especially not in a numbers disadvantage. But that's how it goes. Matchmaking sees my relatively functional skill level, ignores my friends' substantially lower skill potential, and away we go for 12 straight crushing defeats before someone decides this is a waste of time. And I can't fault them! It is absolutely a waste of time to just get steamrolled over and over and over because the game used your twitching corpse to fill ultra-high MMR lobbies instead of offering any kind of balanced experience. And imagine how much worse it is for my friends who are already weak players, trying to come back after extended breaks from the game. Forget about it.

I've been on hiatus from Apex for the better part of a calendar year now, but every once in a while I get the urge to jump back in, thinking SURELY this time it'll be different. I read the other day a post from EA/Respawn (whatever) from the beginning of 2022 describing the "previous" matchmaking system in detail (which I never expected them to ever do) and going pretty vaguely through their alleged plans to rework and revamp said system. They even admitted that the longstanding format, as everyone suspected, was simply matching the entire party to the best player's skill level for the purpose of finding an "appropriate" lobby. But supposedly their preliminary testing data for this new approach supported a more *gasp* balanced matchmaking experience for the majority of skill levels, and they intended to phase out the "highest skill" matchmaking that had made the game so cancerous for so long. I figured, ♥♥♥♥, this was almost a year ago! Surely by NOW it's fully implemented and I can actually rally the lads once more for the ultimate revenge round! Finally I can quench my thirst for this awesome but unplayable game! Then I browse the Steam discussions and some Reddit threads. By all accounts the matchmaking is worse than ever before, with all evidence pointing to some unannounced matchmaking change taking place over the summer. This is the overwhelming consensus online, even factoring out the people who are obviously just irrationally mad or calling everyone a cheater. I firmly believe based on my thousand hours in this game that the cheaters, while they totally do exist, are almost all hanging out in high-level ranked games. It's not common to find cheaters in pubs. However, I can totally understand how newer/less competent players would automatically assume they're facing cheaters when they're getting insta-beamed by players who should NEVER HAVE BEEN IN THEIR LOBBIES.

It's really, really sad to waste a game like this because of something so seemingly fixable. At least from a layman's perspective, why not just matchmake based on the AVERAGE skill level of your team? In our case, that would, in theory, largely squeeze out the top-1% players while also allowing in some people closer to my friends' level. They'd still have a challenge, but it'd be so much fairer for them. I would have a mixed experience, but much better chance of carrying a fight against a slightly stronger team if necessary. Let me be clear in that I do not by any means expect to be able to like, pub-stomp the way Preds do for views or some ♥♥♥♥. I want a challenge that my friends can REASONABLY hold up against, at least SOME of the time. And don't give me that goofy BS about the playerbase being too small to support the kind of solution I'm describing. There's over 120,000 people playing on Steam as I write this on a random Tuesday.

It just sucks. This is far and away my favorite PvP game of all time. I would play it daily if I could, even working full time. I would find time for this game. I would even spend money on skins and ♥♥♥♥, knowing full well that EA is evil and doesn't deserve a penny from me. The game is that freakin' good. In theory. But I gotta stop lying to myself every few months just to be immediately disappointed each time I try to go back. When I mention Apex at this point my friends just laugh and then we return to reality. This game is unplayable. Each season has brought with it some kinda new bugs to exploit or server instability or poor map rotation, etc. But the unfair matchmaking has been the one glaring constant for seemingly the entirety of Apex's existence outside of maybe the beta run, during which I was too bad at the game to notice any critical nuances. But yeah, the community feedback loudly confirms this. Glancing up, I see the recent reviews on Steam have been crap. Shocking. Yet here we are, again, as always. Perhaps EA's market research suggests that they shouldn't fix this problem for some disgusting micro-transaction-related reason. Honestly, at this point, I HOPE the reason is something outwardly malicious like that, if only to confirm that they have a vested interest in NOT fixing anything. Because otherwise there's just truly no excuse. RIP this game.

Update 11.25.23
It's somehow worse than ever. Placed in Silver 2, I'm being put exclusively in Diamond+ lobbies despite my ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ stats this season and no ranked history in the last few seasons. Judging by Reddit/Steam forums, it's a widespread issue. Even in solo queue there is no escape. 'Bout ready to just cut my losses here.

The single downside to this game's existence is that I have a tough time imagining future genre entries living up to the new standard. This is comfortably the best game of its type that I've played. However, the PC port is visually a little weird and restrictive, and I was bewildered to find that the game looked way uglier than I expected using a powerful PC. Below is the fix I used, which was incredibly difficult to find for no reason at all, which makes me think people are just assuming this is the way the game is supposed to look. Don't settle for that.

TIP FOR THOSE WITH OVERQUALIFIED NVIDIA HARDWARE USING EITHER 1080p OR 1440p NATIVE:

Nvidia control panel -> Manage 3D settings -> DSR-Factors dropdown menu, select "2.25x DL" -> DSR smoothness, 33% -> Apply -> open the game, select Fullscreen, you'll see a much higher resolution setting now available to you -> use it!

This basically allows your game to render a sorta bootleg version of a significantly better resolution without making the game harder to run. MASSIVELY improved visuals for me, like night and day. Avoids the ♥♥♥♥ TAA options and allows you to utilize Nvidia DLSS without having weird ♥♥♥♥ happen to your game. You don't need to know what any of this means, you just need to follow those steps if your hardware is significantly better than the recommended (RTX 3080, in my case). Experience the game the way it's meant to look!

Edit: I noticed that a ton of the reviews for this game speak specifically to the online aspect. I didn't bother with the online, and I wouldn't recommend anyone purchase this game for any reason other than the story mode. It is a Rockstar game, after all. I'm certain the online features are totally nonfunctional and hacker-ridden. Just play the masterpiece of a singleplayer story and pretend the rest doesn't exist.

I believe that there's a good game in here somewhere buried beneath the disgustingly awful PC port. Ugly visuals even for being several years old. Regardless of graphical settings, screen tearing persists literally constantly through the entire game. I see other reviews warning about the same issue but it's definitely worth restating that no combination of settings and/or third party applications fixes the complete lack of optimization that this game suffers from. PC specs are irrelevant, fps is irrelevant. That screen will be tearin' to shreds. I made it almost bearable by dropping the resolution way down and playing windowed - easier to overlook this way but the problem was by no means solved. For those who truly don't notice poor performance or play on potatoes anyway this might not matter but good LORD it's really unplayable and very frustrating when your specs far exceed the requirements for maxing this thing out. On top of the ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up visuals, the port is littered with distracting and sometimes game breaking bugs. Any interaction with uneven terrain produces quite a ♥♥♥♥ show. Stealth system? Don't bother. Buttons sometimes just, don't respond for minutes on end, especially the (default) G key that is supposed to open up your communicator. That ♥♥♥♥ works like half the time. Switching weapons often just fails despite running through the animation. Open a crate and you must either wait a few seconds or re-position yourself to access its contents - no reason. Some commands are set to unintuitive keys because of course they are. Climbing and interacting both with E makes for a fun hopping-up-and-down-trying-to-pick-♥♥♥♥-up simulator. Keep in mind all this is just extra ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ because the absence of any kind of optimization alone is enough to kill this game. I forced myself all the way through TEW2 high on Resident Evil after completing the recent remakes and desperate to continue getting my fix wherever possible. Don't be like me. Don't play this game on PC. If you do play this game on PC, don't bother trying to fix the screen tearing and whatnot. I spent a long time digging through all the forums trying every fix. I did the research for you - it is well and truly ♥♥♥♥♥♥. RIP

This game is unplayable for anyone who considers abject and perpetual tedium a negative. I admire all these people giving it positive reviews for their apparent bottomless well of available gaming time and patience to match. I'll even accept those saying they love the horrid visuals. Different strokes and whatever. But otherwise the reviews reflect pure masochism. The actual gameplay is just brutal. Solid idea! Nice blueprint for a game - just couldn't come close in execution. No sense pretending it could.

Prospective mouse and keyboard players: DO NOT BOTHER with the default control scheme. Use a mod to configure your own if you must but even then it's really, really rough.
Once you see the controls you will instantly want to quit - DON'T DITCH THE GAME. It is a very good game. The port is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ horrendous. Get a controller or buy it on PS4, but do play it!

Absolutely brilliant combat and bosses. I'm not a Dark Souls fan at all but From Software is clearly not a one-trick pony. Everything about Sekiro worked perfectly for my taste; the pacing, the atmosphere, the 60 deaths on the first final boss. Some of the most exciting gaming I've ever done and I salivate at the possibility, however improbable, of DLC down the line. All endings, five playthroughs, 100% achievements, and ready for more. 100/10.

The masterful Blood and Wine DLC puts this over the edge as my favorite game to date. A second full playthrough (with a few simple mods) felt just as exhilarating as the first - there's simply too much to do and too many paths to choose to complete it all in one go. Even without any mod help, visually speaking, the game holds up perfectly well, now more than five years after its release. Really, every aspect of the game displays the utmost care that went into its creation. I cannot praise The Witcher 3 enough. If not for Roach being an absolute ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ abomination, I would consider it a perfect game. Seriously though, just play it.

Nosferatu is on sale. The thing's like two bucks.
Screenshot of horrible vampire thing yelling at me. I'm sold.
Two bucks gone, Nosferatu secured.
Attempt to install Nosferatu.
Steam closes unexpectedly.
Retry the install. Success!
Attempt to play Nosferatu.
Half the screen goes black. Only half.
Nosferatu has stopped working.
Attempt to write a review. Need to have used this product for at least five minutes before posting a review.
Spam the Play button, fill my screen with "Nosferatu has stopped working".

69/10 would laugh myself to tears again.