Recent reviews by Vic=HKC=

I discovered FPS with DOOM II when I was a teenager in the mid-90'. And without it, I wouldn't have played Half-Life, Painkiller, Call of Duty, SWAT 3, Delta Force... So when I saw that DOOM + DOOM II version in my library, I was : "WTF, I never bought this game??" I realized that it was The Ultimate Doom being rebranded like this (and all the consequences....). And I saw the achievements. Before blinking my eyes, I installed the game and discovered The Ultimate DOOM, DOOM II, Master Levels for DOOM II and the Final DOOM inside of the game, with two campaigns that I've never heard of: SIGIL and Legacy of Rust.

This is DOOM. It means shooting demons and zombies with weapons like a pistol, (super) shotgun, chaingun, rocket launcher, plasma gun and BFG 9000... without forgetting the fist and the chainsaw. Legacy of Rust replaces the plasma gun and BFG by a flamethrower and the Calamity Blade, can't really describe it apart that it's very very pleasant to use it surrounded by enemies.

But it's DOOM: no jump, no crouch, no look up/down. The good old DOOM.

Let's say that the port on Unity (if I'm not mistaken) is good, I don't really see a difference between old DOOM and this version. And the soundtrack... All the good memories...

Difficulty is the same from I'm Too Young To Die to Nightmare. You can start at any level with a custom difficulty too: no monster for example.

Let's just speak about each game:

DOOM (which includes the fourth episode, Thy Flesh Consumed):
- Divided in four episodes (originally, you had three)
- Knee-Deep in the Dead is the shareware/demo and sets the tone for the rest of the game. Set in Phobos at the start of the Doom Guy story. My favorite episode, easy unless you're choosing Ultra-Violence or Nightmare.
- The Shores of Hell, set on Deimos, which shows Hell taking over the base if I may say that like this. Includes the Cyberdemon
- Inferno, set in Hell, with hellish design and levels with names like Unholy Cathedral and House of Pain. Interesting level: the secret one, Warrens which starts like the first, Hell Keep. Or the level designed like a hand... Includes the Spider Mastermind
- Thy Flesh Consumed, set on Earth apparently, where you're avenging the death of your pet. Very hard challenge from the beginning to the end.

SIGIL
- Designed for the 25th birthday
- Set in Hell again
- Very interesting levels (Cages of the Damned or Halls of Perdition)

DOOM II
- No episodes, just 32 levels for the whole story
- Set on Earth during an invasion of the demons
- Interesting levels mid-games as they're situated in a more "urban" setting
- Icon of Sin: ouch... can't do it without godmode anymore
- Super Shotgun
- Unfortunately: Arch-vile...
- Secret levels: Wolfenstein-themed!

EDIT: No Rest for the Living
- Nice designed levels
- Hard from the beginning
- Constantly on edge for the ammo
- I didn't remember playing it in DOOM 3 BFG despite having the achievement. I quite forgot also about this during the writing of the review.

Master Levels
- Collection of maps done by fans: dubbed the best
- Quite mitigated for them: some of them are clearly good, others are meh or WTF. Black Tower for example is set as the tenth level and is a spike in difficulty after nine relatively easy levels.

Final DOOM:
- TNT Evilution and Plutonia Experiment separated in two games
- Spike in difficulty: both of the campaigns have their difficulties. Hunted in Plutonia is a nightmare: only Arch-Viles! But very interesting level designs!
- Pharaoh and Carribean (TNT) as secret levels... very very refreshing and different from sci-fi or Hell!
- Cyberden (Plutonia) is OK though hard but Go 2 It... it's hard in Hurt Me Plenty, I can't imagine in UV or Nightmare!

Legacy of Rust:
- Two new episodes from 2024
- New enemies: the Banshee is hurting my ears and what is that sound for the shock trooper when they die?
- New weapons: I prefer my plasma gun and BFG though the Calamity Blade is good - inspiration from DOOM (2016) and Eternal?
- Vulcan Abyss: Good episode. Feel like DOOM or DOOM II.
- Counterfeit Eden: Starts as run, run and spare ammo. Then second level is good, third is hard, fourth feels like good old Doom... and afterwards, it's hard, hard and hard. Silo Soul is nice visually and interesting but too much enemies... and Cyberdemons. Interesting end though.
- Panopticon, secret level in Counterfeit Eden, is just... small hallways and a Cyberdemon shooting at you. No real rest.

Should you buy this? Hell yeah! I mean, I'm quite biased when it comes to DOOM but yeah it's worthy.

Let me tell you something: making an objective review would be hard for me as Lara Croft is a real icon for me and the young girl I was when Tomb Raider landed on my parents' computer. I'll always be very biased with Tomb Raider 1, Tomb Raider 2, let's just say big spiders prevented me to really enjoy fully the game and Tomb Raider 3 was good. The remastered is good enough for me, I don't care about controls as I'm under the impression that I'm playing like nearly 30 years ago. After the patches, I feel like now, the remastered versions are way more enjoyable.

But like I've said, I'm very partial. I could find flaws (hello, the soft lock of Lara with her head stuck in a rock and not possible to remove her, hello, my strong tendancy to make the wrong jump, hello, what's with these achievements where I CANNOT USE THESE SNOWMOBILES? or WHY DO YOU WANT ME TO MANAGE TO DO PRECISE JUMPS? or WHAAAAT, 5 or 6H TO BEAT IT??? - heartbreaking for skipping secrets to gain minutes). I could also whine about the enemies and their strong health, well Atlanteans and Mafiosos, I feel like they're harder to kill (but in the same time, when you do the pistols run only....) and don't tell me about New Game+, I don't know how I managed to survive Atlantis and Tibet and Home Sweet Home. I still have to do Tomb Raider 3 though but I'm pretty sure I'll have the same mindset: how did I managed to survive this?

I could also still say that you still have some graphical problems but heck, I'm overlooking it. Good music, good graphics and the possibility to skip to the original game.

And you have the add-ons with them (Unfinished Business/Gold, Golden Mask and Last Artifacts), because let's be real, back then, you couldn't call them DLC, you had to physically buy the CD where all the files were on.

But yeah, I'm very biased and partial with Tomb Raider. Sorry but for me, it's "take my money" situation. Replay the classic games with improved graphics AND achievements is a great experience.

NB: I've succumbed to the take my money now that we know that TRIV, V and VI are also remastered.

I'm on Observation Duty 5 is introducing more levels and a new feature but is still using the camera watching gameplay.

The goal is to report any anomaly (object appearance, disappearance, moving, door opening/closing, intruders, ghosts, abyss, etc etc..). If you don't find them, once you hit 4 anomalies active, it's game over. Some intruders/ghosts are also killing you if you don't dispatch them quick enough.

However, three of the levels are using the core gameplay of reporting both the room and the type of anomaly (School, Market, Metro), with the UI from the previous game, where everything is available in a single screen. I must say that these levels were quite fun.

The other levels were fun enough, except the Bank. The House, Apartment and Bank are using a new feature: just report the room where you think an anomaly is happening. However, the downside of getting reports faster is that at the third false report, it's game over. So you really have to be attentive. And this is where a level like the Bank can be quite painful because of the level of the details and the view from the first camera, where you can see the main floor from afar.

Like I've said, I was getting burned out by the series, as you have to replay (or not) a lot to get the secret ending for this game, but also, because I did the series in a row, which is kinda a bad idea. I loved the new feature and I do hope this will be the "hard mode" for the sixth game.

Getting more content was also a good feeling, because from two levels in 1, 2 and 3, we have gone up to three in 4 and now 6.

I'm still recommending the game because it's still nice to have these jumpscares and searching for details changing is challenging and fun.

I'm letting a secret out: I did the levels for most of them with friends watching my stream (privately - I don't stream) and with all the games, though to get what all achievements, I've obviously played also alone. It helps breaking the "boreness" and "burned out" feeling. This is where the game is probably the most fun.

I'm on Observation Duty 4 is returning to the camera watching gameplay, after a third game adapted to VR (though it can be played by non-VR players). This time, you have three levels: two houses and a police station, which is a change as all the levels in the past were houses (except the HQ level in the third game).

The goal is to report any anomaly (object appearance, disappearance, moving, door opening/closing, intruders, ghosts, abyss, etc etc..). If you don't find them, once you hit 4 anomalies active, it's game over. Some intruders/ghosts are also killing you if you don't dispatch them quick enough.

What I appreciate the most is the change of UI: you don't have anymore a dropdown to choose but you hall all the options: you just have to click on the room and on the type of anomaly. That's a good enhancement for me.

The problem of this game is that it's very dark by default, the station can unplayable as it's very dark, however, to counter this, Notovia added a brightness button, so that we can see better what's happening. Some anomalies are so difficult to spot compared to others that more light is better than risking to miss something and experience a game over.

I must say that with this game, I was beginning to "burn out" and to loose my patience at the start of a level because, well, you know that it's slow-paced in the beginning before speeding up hour by hour. Still, I'm nearly done with the 6 and I find myself less and less enthusiastic to replay levels for achievements. I think that the station proved to be the starting point but then, I've played the first five games in a row, it might explained that feeling of repetitiveness.

However, the fourth game is a good pick in the series, so I recommend it.

I'm on Observation Duty 3 is the third game in the series where you check cameras for anomalies and report them before it's too late. However, this one is different: it's a VR game, albeit Notovia made a version non-VR. As I don't play in VR yet, I'll speak about my experience of the non-VR gameplay.

You still have to find anomalies apart that you're not behind a camera but on foot, armed with a smartphone that will send any anomaly (or not) you find. It means that you have to switch physically (in the game) rooms. It's more scary when you run into an intruder (naked men or women looking at you strangely) but it also skyrocketed my paranoia because of that.

It means also that you're playing in colors, even if it's the night. Gameplay mechanics were nerfed because it's a VR version but don't ask me why, it's my least favorite game in the series. Maybe because the camera mechanics suited me better than running around and praying not to find something weird in the house or at HQ - because yeah, HQ is also subject to anomalies.

So why I'm still recommending it? Because despite that change of gameplay (suited for a VR version), I still find it interesting and that it's refreshing somewhere, to have something more dynamic, though the rest of the series is back to the camera gameplay.

You've been invited by a lord about something important concerning your daughter Lisa. However, she is kidnapped by a strange figure. You don't have a choice but track down the being in the Mirror World.

The plot has potential. I mean, tracking down the seven deadly sins is a nice storyline. However, I feel like there are some timeline problems: the starting point is 1853 and the story is taken place into the present and should 200 years later. But nothing screams 2053. Nothing screams 'we're in a contemporary world' apart the outfit of the protagonist and some cutscenes.

The gameplay is classic for that kind of games: find items to use, find objects in hidden objects scenes or logical pairs, solve minigames. This is where the game fails the most: some minigames are very hard and can take long to solve. Sometimes, the description of what you have to do is not even precise enough, result: you're lost. And I don't speak about the find logical pairs, because some of the logical pairs aren't logical at all. The hidden objects scenes are not easy for some items to find too. And I don't speak about finding your ways: each time I've started a new section, I was stuck quickly and I took so much time to find my way - because this stubborn girl doesn't want to use hints though at the end, I was so fed up that I used them (not in the hidden object scenes).

The worst is the number of times the game crashed or closed itself. I would say that I'm at a count of five. Meh, it even crashed in the middle of an hard minigame...

Graphically, it's correct, soundtrack is OK, no real voice acting apart for the seven sins and it's gibberish.

Avoid this title unless you're an hardcore fan of the genre or if you're an achievement hunter.

I'm on Observation Duty 2 has the same gameplay as the first game: through a series of cameras, you're tasked to detect any anomaly (going from object appearance/move/disappearance to intruders/ghosts) and to report them before it's too late (4 anomalies active at the same time means game over, or simply let an intruder stay too much time and they will kill you). You have to survive from midnight till 6 AM.

There are however some difference with the first game:
* It's not more grayscale, it's full color
* In the Cursed House level, you can activate a second camera to have a view of a room at all time but it's taking a part of the current view (so if an anomaly is hidden behind, you don't see it).
* You have more rooms to watch
* The House in the Past is graphically different: it's graphics from good old retro adventure PSX games, which is fun.


No soundtrack is available, meaning that you have the ambiant sounds, which is sometimes more oppressive. I must say that I hated the Cursed House because you had so much details to take into account in it but also so "colored" that you don't always see an anomaly. The House in the Past, while colored, was way more funny to do than the Cursed House.

I must also say that the sexual act that is in the game was not expected, was way more explicit and well... it cimented by decision not to do any video because I'm incompetent when it comes to video edit, I'm lazy to do it and I hate censoring my playthrough, like I had to do with Martha is Dead.

But well, I don't understand while it's a second game instead of adding levels in the first game but hey, I've seen many developers do this, so, not going to judge and think about money grab, probably, there is a pertinent reason to that (technic, or the aesthetics of this one not fitting into the first game or simply because of the secret ending).

I'm not going to say that it's a nice evolution but it's still an enjoyable game, though this one and the next one are not my favorite.

Deiland: Pocket Planet Edition tells the tale of a young boy - or Prince - waking on a pocket planet called Deiland and discovered by Mun from the Intergalactic Patrol. The Prince will have to learn to fish, harvest, cut trees, plant them, mine, craft and cook. He will have also some visitors once in a while with whom he can trade and receive quests. However, the seasons are cycling, so something that can be harvested during spring and summer can't be planted during autumn and winter. And also, some enemies will pop up, meteors (or space mail with good stuff) will crash on the planet. You can rotate the planet by the way.

If it's similar to Summer in Mara or Ankora: Lost Days, well, it's the same universe, the same editor and the same gameplay. If you want to advance in the story (and the ending IS not the end of the game), well, you'll need to be attentive to the seasons (I got the giant pumpkin quest and too bad, I was in the wrong season to harvest it - and it took me a while to understand how to make it giant...). Also, after a while, the fruits or seeds from the trees/bushes disappear if you don't grab them in time. Then you can also travel with Mun to Ankora, in the north parth of the planet, meeting some familiar faces, now older (Nidawi, Umi and Hute). Chronologically after Summer in Mara and Ankora: Lost Days, the game was released earlier than Summer in Mara from what I've understood.

It is a very repetitive game, sometimes, I didn't know what to do (not enough guidance for some quests), I mean, I was expecting to get some wool from my sheep but I was waiting for a quest to learn it. Apparently, you have to buy it. What saves the game is the small planet and the rotating mechanics else it would have been boring.

And when you're trying to build some savings and make sure you have anough ressources, yes, it is boring as hell. But with patience, you're rewarded, though I was not very happy to wait a long time for a specific enemy to appear to achieve a quest and so, make sure I've done 100% of the tasks.

Graphics are fine and sountrack is, what a surprise, shared with Mara and Ankora.

I didn't play the old Deiland, so I can't compare but I'm pretty neutral with the game, I'm still recommending it if you're a fan of the Mara universe, though get it when there is a large discount.

When I played that game, it was just to see what was about this series of horror watching cameras games. I was killed quickly, because well, you have to learn first the layout of the rooms but I kept pushing and I managed to survive.

What is then the gameplay - the lore is quasi inexistant in that game? Well, you're tasked from midnight to 6 AM to watch a location through cameras and to report any anomalies appearing (or not - objects can disappear!). It goes from reporting an intruder (that can kill you), a shadow, objects moving, extra objects, doors opening or closing, distortion, camera malfunction, abyss, lights, etc etc..

It's pretty addicting BUT there is one big problem with that game (and others): for some anomalies, you report the logic type but then, it's refused because well, the intruder is a ghost or the intruder is labeled under Others. Yeah, some anomalies are difficult to label and the game is already "hard" to spot some subtle changes that well, that kind of things is reducing the enthusiasm to play the game.

You have a menu to report, so, compared to the future of the franchise, the mechanics can be seen as annoying as you can loose time there. How many times I forgot to change the room? A lot of time.

You have only two levels: an old house and a new house. Both of the levels are fun, however, I'd like to warn anyone that the game contains naked beings (though you don't see the genitals themselves) and even a sexual act (well, you can't see the whole thing but you can easily guess what it is). It's not that I was disgusted by it, I'm an adult and can handle these visuals but I wasn't expecting that in the game.

Anyway, do no expect soundtrack, it's very quiet, which is spooky in itself.

It is the beginning of the series, with the 6th game released earlier this month, and while now, you have more content and a more easy way to report, I still recommend to play this. I mean, you need to play this else the HUGE MAN will not be happy at all!

Ankora: Lost Days puts you in the shoes of Mun, a member of the Intergalactic Patrol, who crashes on Ankora. Exploring around and meeting the locals, she will be involved in a fight to keep peace...

The game is set in the Mara universe, though I don't know what was released first. I suspect Ankora to be older in that aspect, though in the Mara universe, it seems to happen after all the Mara games released by the time of the writing.

The gameplay is simple: you can visit Ankora parcel by parcel: you see if you go north, south, east or west. Not every path is possible and for those who seems unavailable, you have to think and to use your tool. At first, you have nothing, then you find an hammer, which allows you to build structures, like a bridge, stairs or a table. The table can help crafting tools or specific objects, which in turn can be traded to a merchant. Mun can also cook, providing she's unlocking the recipe, which is the same for potions. You can also terraform the fields around you, saw the trees, fish in water with bubbles, mine the rocks (or ask a local to mine for you when you have a mine) or later in the game, harvest vegetables and fruits. You're exploring around while being given quests. You have to pay attention to your energy and health, because there are enemies in the game. Enemies can also drop items. You can also open chests and get valuable things.

However, it is repetitive and not always easy to understand why you have a "speak to X for the next mission" and speaking to X is not unlocking anything. In fact, sometimes, you have to finish someone else's task before! Contrary to Mara, having a lot of money isn't easy to have, as the ressources are not eternal (apart for the fish and flowers and harvest) because you learn late in the game how to plant a tree. But at least, you can keep up to 999 instances of the same item, which in turn, can be interesting when selling to a merchant.

I largerly preferred Mara, probably because it was easier and without any enemy. But Ankora stays an interesting game, graphically fine and with a good soundtrack, although, well, it's sharing the tracks with Summer in Mara.

I'm recommending it, only by a hair, because this is where a "neutral" thumb would have been helpful. It's not bad but it's not that good either. Buy it with a large discount.