Recent reviews by eagleflo

What a pleasant surprise. Sandfall, a new French studio is now releasing a bona fide JRPG set in a wildly imaginative world as their debut game.

The game borrows from many Japanese games that have come before it -- I see a lot of Final Fantasy X and XIII in the world-building and level design, Persona 5 in the turn-based combat system spiced up with dodges, parries and jumps from Sekiro out of all places. Despite strong influences and some clear homages the game doesn't feel the least bit derivative -- this is an original work of art. The Belle Époque motif works really well and feels rather fresh.

The soundtrack by Lorien Testard and Alice Duport-Percier deserves a special mention -- it's just one banger after another, beautiful French soprano & choir accompanied by strings and piano. I stopped advancing just to hear the rest of the song quite a few times. The way the music is woven into the story and characters feels extremely well done. There are even multiple different battle themes per area. The voice cast is also amazingly stacked, with Jennifer English (Shadowheart from BG3), Charlie Cox (Daredevil) & Ben Starr (Clive from FFXVI) in the lead roles.

It's honestly unbelievable that this is the debut game of a studio staffed by only around 30 people. The game doesn't feel at all like it was made by such a tiny team! Compare that to the 4000+ people working on GTA VI right now. It's an amazing showcase of what a skilled team can do with Unreal Engine 5. It's striking how strong impression the game leaves in every area of its presentation.

As I'm very close to 100% completion while writing this review, I can confidently say that this will be my Game of the Year 2025. In this world where AAA budgets have gotten completely out of hand and both developers and players suffer, it's a shining beacon of hope for more tight and focused AA-sized teams being able to deliver their completely uncompromised artistic vision.

Criminally overlooked when it first released, still the shooter with the best movement in 2025. The guns feel great, the sound design & atmosphere is through the roof. TTK is short as it should be, no bullet sponges here. The servers were ruined for years by hackers but now work again.

In short, the good bits of Apex Legends can be tracked right back into this game. The serious compromises and nerfs made in Apex Legends for console audience & mass-market appeal are not here. The skill cap is extremely high, and that means that you'll get wrecked when you first start playing. Just take it in stride and learn.

There is also a great single player campaign. This game is easily worth it for that alone. BT-7274.

There is a reason why everyone wants Respawn to make Titanfall 3. Unfortunately, the people behind this game have left the studio.

This is an excellent game to learn Japanese with for the intermediate & advanced learner.

The game is fully voice acted by an awesome cast. There is a message log for repeating lines if necessary -- but that should be rare, since the game is push to continue in 99% of places. This is a mature game so there is no furigana. It can, however, be hooked with Textractor to easily use browser-based lookup tools.

The story is written by Kotaro Uchikoshi, the creator of 999 and Zero Escape series. What starts as a paint-by-the-numbers detective story soon evolves into something far beyond that premise. The characters are interesting, and develop well during the game. The style is half-serious, half-joking -- some of the jokes probably won't land without being familiar with anime tropes to some degree.

Do not let yourself get spoiled! Just play the game until the end without looking up anything. It's very easy to do an achievement run afterward, if you so wish.

Well, I finally finished it four years later. Version 2.2 is certainly a much better game than was released in 2020.

The worldbuilding and graphics are top notch. It's a very beautiful world. During the first few hours you can certainly lose yourself in immersion -- don't rush through Act I too fast. However, the veneer of immersion is paper thin -- the relative emptiness and sameyness of the world becomes quite clear after some repetition, especially the filler content with NCPD scanner hustles.

The story content is uneven. Act I is *amazing*, followed by multiple possible paths, some more interesting than others. The open world curse is here in full effect: with so many avenues to pursue, the red line of engaging plot is easily lost. Don't overdo side content at the cost of main story, or you might never make it to the end.

Phantom Liberty is quite clearly the best story arc of the entire game, being much more contained, so definitely play that content the moment it becomes available. I wish the rest of the game was on this storytelling level. The characters are somehow much better developed here, Johnny Silverhand very much included.

The game is *way* too easy on normal, at least when playing with a keyboard and mouse. Start on hard or very hard, otherwise you're going to be ridiculously overpowered very early on. Unfortunately stealth gameplay rarely feels worth it; it's so much easier to just use a silenced gun and start shooting. Apart from a few audio messages congratulating you after a gig, the game mostly doesn't care how you solve the challenges it puts in front of you.

I've been a fighting game casual ever since I first played Street Fighter II on SNES & Mega Drive back in the mid-90s. This game finally pulled me in all the way -- what a genre! It's so much deeper than I first thought.

There is a very robust single player mode called the World Tour that's an excellent way to ease into playing Street Fighter little by little, unlocking the movesets for different characters over ~30 hours of gameplay. Once you finish that you're ready for real battles online. The tutorial modes are very well made. You can choose between two different control schemes, Modern and Classic. Modern is simpler, but sacrifices some damage for being able to do specials with a single button -- I started with Classic right away, as that's how we used to play it on Mega Drive's six button controller.

The characters are quite well balanced and have lots of variance. There is a good mix of classic characters and new entrants. There is great depth to the movesets -- it takes a lot of time to get good with even one character. I see this as a really good thing for replayability. That doesn't mean that you can't be effective with a character early on, just that there's more depth available once you really put in the hours.

I was also really happy that there's a Battle Hub with tons of old arcade games included -- I just love to give these a go every now and then. I miss arcades.

If you've been staying away from fighting games because they seem too hard to master, give this one a try. You might be pulled in like I was.

Despite multiple playthroughs, apparently I never dared to write a review. In the hopes of catching one of my friends looking at this game tentatively over the upcoming Steam Sales, here goes...

This is the best narrative-driven CRPG in the last 25 years.

The writing feels so alive, every word of it. The art is evocative, as if Hieronymus Bosch reincarnated and painted a triptych depicting our modern broken world. The soundtrack by British Sea Power fits the game perfectly. The story and characters pull you in right away. The combined vibes are just off the charts. This is a real work of art.

The game gives you tools to shape your character with a one-of-a-kind skill system. In addition to typical skill checks it provides additional internal dialogue interjections and options. Thought Cabinet gives you further bonuses and maluses as you choose what kind of thoughts to internalize. These systems are mechanically perfect for this style of game. As in any good RPG, you roll a lot of dice. The failed rolls are often funnier than the successful ones. If you can't accept the outcome, most of the rolls can be retried later. Trying again fits the theme of the game perfectly. There are tons of hidden modifiers unlocked by exploring the world and engaging with the game. The game consistently rewards exploration and engaging with it.

The game lives and dies by its script. Over one million words, now fully voice-acted in The Final Cut, with delightful acting throughout. The game doesn't hesitate to be real -- it isn't at all afraid of confronting and calling out the player. Some of the topics it deals with are incredibly heavy, and not often encountered in games. There is a lot of black humor weaved in. It's very Estonian in character, something I bonded with right away as a Finn. The failures of communism, socialism, capitalism, fascism and centrism are all explored here in depth. The game gets crushingly sad at times, yet nonetheless it is permeated with a sense of vague hope. It can be a journey of healing.

The only reason to skip this game is if you're not a reader or suffer from attention span issues. The full voice acting only helps up to a point. It demands attention and rewards patience.

The only relevant point of comparison is to Planescape: Torment, an obscure CRPG from 1999 that was previously my uncontested favorite CRPG of all time. It is a similarly word-heavy story, with a similarly amnesiac main character, but if we are being real, Planescape suffers from its Dungeons & Dragons engine and combat. The setting is completely different and the story being told hits completely different beats. Clearly Planescape: Torment served as a faint inspiration, but the comparisons don't do Disco Elysium justice.

I'm frankly surprised that five years after release, this style and the mechanics haven't been copied by other games. Perhaps that is for the best. This is a unique masterpiece, and unluckily for us the studio that made it has disintegrated since, in a very Disco Elysium fashion. (Most negative reviews you see are kneejerk reactions to what went down.) Life imitates art.

The real game begins when you reach the end credits.

The near endless replayability combined with the addictive gameplay and a game design that just *gets* it is a dangerous combination. Just one more round...

Works great on Steam Deck as well.

Exactly what it says on the tin. This is a collection of all Zachtronics' solitaire games over the years, topped up with one brand new solitaire, Fortune's Foundation. If you like solitaire, there is nothing better on Steam.

Awful cash grab, already completely obsolete. There is nothing of value here.