Recent reviews by VegeChips

New Halo video game feels fresh and fast paced for a modern audience, fully equipped with features like conveniently marked weapon spawns, enemy outlines, and sprint to piss off the sweaty veterans. Simply put, 343 has done their best to declare that this is a Return To Form; a clever disguise of what is really just a banishment of 343's previous mistakes alongside enough polished additions to be as hella addictive as possible so they can rake in that rep as being the saviours of halo. All is well here I suppose.

What really grinds the gears of anyone with enough common sense of the ways corporations viciously attempt to drain your paypal is this game's moneytization system. Progression through aesthetic masturbation (as it was in MCC) has been foiled with the introduction of battle passes. Now you gotta buy em every season . . . free to play I guess . . . aww okay then. But the real back slapper is the XP gain. You only get XP for completing challenges and those require specific game modes and unfun ways of playing, making it an ultimate grind to get your carefully rarefied piece of armour. All this on top of the exorbitant presence of XP boosters, premium challenge slots - and just the whole ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ battle pass reward thing being thrown in your face every second menu - really illustrate a rather greater problem gone soarly yet unmissed in the landscape of video game entertainment; this is a live service.

oiya 'op on spliffgate.

AAAAWUBADUGH!

A baka mitai simulator and one of the best games I have ever played.

A flawed gem. Prey is a true immersive sim at heart, featuring excellent tight level design, wonderfully detailed space-station environment, interesting story, and a resource based combat system that will often keep you challenged and thinking about encounters.

However, I feel the game's flaws lie in some rushed development. The third act feels quite underwhelming in terms of difficulty/enemies and the ending could have been more fleshed out. These things, alongside some few minor limiting design decisions (that perhaps call back a little too much to previous games in the genre i.e system shock 2), do hurt what could have been a masterpiece of the immersive sims and of gaming in general.

Nevertheless, Prey is still a shining example of the excellence and potential of the dwindling immersive sim genre and that's why love it. It gives me hope. Really, I just want more games like these.

Finally, the real Dark Souls of 2D platformers. Perfection.

One of the most beautiful games I have ever played. The Outer Wilds is a brilliant example of the potential of player agency and interaction with a game environment, creating a level of connection to storytelling that is so wonderfully special and unique. It is ultimately how many games should be.

The game is not perfect, however. I found many puzzles to be either too vague or just plain obvious. Some of the hints you are meant to find didn't really help me, leaving me a bit stuck at some points and even resulting in me just looking up the answers out of frustration.
The game's 'rumour tree' is meant to guide players in specific directions. I felt that this system could have been communicated better, as I felt aimless and overwhelmed with nodes at times. This was because I didn't properly understand how it was meant to be used until later in the game. Also because this 'rumour tree' can only be accessed from your ship, I sometimes felt like I had to play with a physical journal, writing things down, to remember when on foot.

But to hell with those things, I just want more games like this. It has lovely music too!

(Review text hidden)

Is it a manifestation of death or a celebration of life? Discover for yourself.
Whatever you do, don't you dare go Hollow.

review for video game