Review The Last Game You Beat

[Henry Spencer]

Metal Gear Solid 4

The worst Kojima game I've played through, but that's not saying much. 5/10

Fixed.

[Mr357]

Metal Gear Solid 4

The worst Kojima game I've played through, but that's not saying much. 5/10

Fixed.

Wrong, I haven't played MGS4. 2 doesn't really stand a chance against 1, 3, and Snatcher. I can't really count MG 1 or 2 since I haven't even gotten halfway through either one, and Ground Zeros was just a tech demo.

[OL]

Just finished Ratchet & Clank: Into the Nexus. Started it way back when it first came out in 2013, but I think I just got distracted by something else before I could finish. So I picked it up this time right in the middle. Just rewatched the cutscenes to remember the story and kept going.
Always a great time, same as any R&C game. I was actually a bit surprised by the jetpack gameplay though; this one must feature some of the largest, most open levels in the series, letting you hover wherever the hell you want within reason. Very fun having aerial battles with other flying enemies like this.
The story is basically just a kind of side-story epilogue to the R&C Future trilogy. It's not bad. Certainly not as epic and grandiose as A Crack in Time was (god, that game was fantastic), but it's always enjoyable playing through any R&C adventure, no matter its relative size.
Kind of bittersweet though; if I'm right, Into the Nexus is technically the "final" game in the original timeline. The new game coming out next year is meant to tie in to the altered rendition of the first game's story that the upcoming movie is going to be doing. And I don't really have a problem with that at all; they aren't really changing anything about the characters themselves, just the basic events that bring everything together. The movie looks great, just about as faithful to the games as any videogame movie could possibly be, so there's nothing wrong with the next games following suit. But Nexus still technically counts as an ending since the established timeline is being abandoned, so to speak. And true endings are always kind of a melancholy thing to me. After thirteen years of adventures, the slate is being wiped clean so they can start over. And does Nexus have a great enough ending to fit such a situation as that?
Not really. It's an okay ending if we were definitely going to see a continuation. But we're not. So it's slightly sad.
Whatever the case, at least the series does indeed have a future, and that's something the be glad about. Can't freakin wait for the next game, and if I'm entirely honest, I'm actually more excited for the movie than I am for any other flick coming out between now and then.

[OL]

"Finished" Assassin's Creed Syndicate ("finished" in quotations because there's still plenty more I can do in it).
As with all AC games, it has some problems, and it doesn't feel as polished as it really should... but holy hell is this ever a huge step up from Unity. Despite liking it well enough on a very basic level, Unity was honestly pretty weak in most of the ways that matter. The gameplay felt weirdly slow, the climbing seemed awkward, combat just kinda sucked (I understand they were trying to mix it up from before, but it just wasn't fun at all), and dammit all, the story felt almost completely pointless by the end. Pretty much a total waste of the French Revolution basis, which could have led to great things, but instead was squandered.
Syndicate fixes pretty much all of that. Gameplay is a little faster, the climbing is finally great (and the grappling hook adds to that a ridiculous amount of fun), the combat is much, much better (feels more like the older games, except the counters don't automatically kill; enemies take a bit of beating first), and the story is a whole helluva lot better. Part of it may be that the enemies this time aren't a bunch of shoehorned-in historical figures (since people of the time still have living relatives, and it'd be kinda shitty to crap all over their ancestors by making them badguys). Rather, the villains are original creations for the first time, and because of it we now have some of the better antagonists in the entire series, who actually receive some amount of development before their inevitable demises (a rare thing in this series; usually they show up in one mission and get killed in the same one). Starrick, the sort of "main" badguy, is probably my favorite; just a really great performance by the actor playing him, understated in most parts, over-the-top when it matters.
Not to mention that Jacob and Evie are such better protagonists than Arno ever was in Unity. At the very least the fact that they have English accents actually makes sense this time (I know I go on about that a lot when talking about Unity, but goddamn did they ever ruin that game by removing any trace of the people being French). But beyond that, they're just quip-ier and more fun to spend an entire game with. Such to the extent that, honestly, I'd love to see another game starring the two of them. It won't happen, but I'd like to see it regardless, and that's what matters.
Even the "modern day" story is soooo much better this time. Not everyone digs it, but at least there's some sort of beginning, middle, and end this time, unlike in Unity where it was basically "Hey initiate, you're going to be diving into the memories of Arno," and then ended with a half-assed "Good job initiate, now you're done... and uh... bye." Nice to see some actual development in the story again, and it ends by pointing in a pretty damn interesting direction. Only problem is, much like Unity, the modern-day scenes are entirely non-interactive. They're just videos. Personally, I always liked actually having a hand in things, first playing as Desmond in the initial games, then playing as an unnamed Animus user in Black Flag and Rogue. Made story developments feel a little more affecting and valuable when you're taking part, rather than just watching.
Otherwise, the only real complaint I have about the game (aside from a slight lack of polish) is that the load times are unnecessarily long, which is something that'll probably be fixed up with patches. Otherwise, definitely one of the best entries in the series for me, up there with Revelations, Rogue, and Black Flag. Now I'm just finishing some things up. Just discovered a portal to a completely separate time period, which is intriguing as hell.
Looking forward to the next game, definitely more than I was after Unity.

And I don't mind saying that Evie is crazy hot. Yeah, I'm sure there'll be talk of her being respectfully-portrayed and all that, because that's the "it" topic these days. And that's nice and all (and true), but whatever. She's a hot character. Great voice and personality and all that. Plus, she looks good in the fight club rings.

[Monkei]

Tales from the Borderlands

Just finished up the last episode of this. Overall it was..cute.. it has its moments but the story was really all over the place. No real clear direction throughout all the episodes. Each episode the plot and goal for the main character(s) change and theirs honestly too many characters to keep up with that I found it hard to care for anyone other than the 2 main characters Rhys and Fiona.

Visually it was cool. As most telltale games are.
Music was good.
Gameplay standard affair with some Shenmue 2 style QTE's in the end.

In the end, its not really easy to recommend this to anyone but the biggest of Borderlands fans. I was never really that into the world or whatever little lore about it so this game scratches a non-existant itch for me.

Really the only reason I played it was because it was part of a sale bundle of Telltale games awhile ago on PSN and basically I got both Walking Dead Seasons 1&2, Game of Thrones, The Wolf Among Us and Tales from the Borderlands all for something like $30.

Overall compared to all of those its the weakest of the lot. Actually I think this is the weakest Telltale game I've played. Back to the Future was also better than this and even that wasn't the greatest even though I'm ofcourse a big fan of BTTF.

Anyways, the game gets a.. 2/5
Something like that..
Definitely only buy it on sale.

I haven't played and don't care much about the Borderlands games. I got Tales from the Borderlands because I'm in love with Telltale, and I wasn't disappointed in the slightest. On the contrary. This is easily a 9.5/10 for me. Great story, great characters (Gortys!) and brilliant humour. To me it's right up there with The Walking Dead (with Game of Thrones being the weakest of that package you mentioned), quality wise. Don't really get your complaint about the plot either, it's about finding the traveller's vault from episode 1 to episode 5?

[Axm]

Tales from the Borderlands

Just finished up the last episode of this. Overall it was..cute.. it has its moments but the story was really all over the place. No real clear direction throughout all the episodes. Each episode the plot and goal for the main character(s) change and theirs honestly too many characters to keep up with that I found it hard to care for anyone other than the 2 main characters Rhys and Fiona.

Visually it was cool. As most telltale games are.
Music was good.
Gameplay standard affair with some Shenmue 2 style QTE's in the end.

In the end, its not really easy to recommend this to anyone but the biggest of Borderlands fans. I was never really that into the world or whatever little lore about it so this game scratches a non-existant itch for me.

Really the only reason I played it was because it was part of a sale bundle of Telltale games awhile ago on PSN and basically I got both Walking Dead Seasons 1&2, Game of Thrones, The Wolf Among Us and Tales from the Borderlands all for something like $30.

Overall compared to all of those its the weakest of the lot. Actually I think this is the weakest Telltale game I've played. Back to the Future was also better than this and even that wasn't the greatest even though I'm ofcourse a big fan of BTTF.

Anyways, the game gets a.. 2/5
Something like that..
Definitely only buy it on sale.

I haven't played and don't care much about the Borderlands games. I got Tales from the Borderlands because I'm in love with Telltale, and I wasn't disappointed in the slightest. On the contrary. This is easily a 9.5/10 for me. Great story, great characters (Gortys!) and brilliant humour. To me it's right up there with The Walking Dead (with Game of Thrones being the weakest of that package you mentioned), quality wise. Don't really get your complaint about the plot either, it's about finding the traveller's vault from episode 1 to episode 5?

Ya but then theirs so many different sub plots and things that change the story every second that it had me lost. I would have appriciated more continuity then making each episode about a new set of antics. And the jokes fell flat on me. I laughed maybe twice over all the episodes.
To each their own though. I can understand the appeal is there for other people, just not for me. Game of Thrones and Wolf Among Us are more my speed.

[redline]

metal gear solid 5.


grand promises, impressive graphics, awesome "1st" hospital level but quickly descends into repetitive gameplay with a weak story and terrible ending.. a real shame.. another indication of what a demand of a quick profit can do ( konami apparently pushed the game through and even made kojima cut stuff out)

unlike other mgs games, i doubt many fans will want to replay this game in the future. 8/10

[OL]

So I played through the main game of Watch_Dogs for the second time (first time was roughly a year ago), and finally played through the DLC campaign, Bad Blood, which I finished just now.
And y'know... there's soooo much criticism out there for the game, some of it simply noting a basic feeling of "meh" about it, while much of the rest of it amounts to literal hate. And I keep trying to understand it all, but for some damn reason it's all flying right the hell over my head.
I love this game.
Now that I've let time pass and revisited the whole thing a little later, I can very safely say that it's now one of my favorite games. Yeah, seriously.
And it feels odd to say that since there's so much shit-talking that goes on about it. I suppose I can understand well enough why some people say "blah" and shrug their shoulders to it (not going to appeal to everyone, obviously), but I can't for the life of me conceive why so many others are so... venomous toward it. Claiming it to be unplayable and all that. Ridiculous.
Is it just a result of them allowing themselves to get overhyped for it, which would inevitably lead to them being let down (a problem I didn't have at all, because I didn't get hyped for it in the least)?
I don't know. But I've literally gone down a list of complaints that I've read people having about the game, and they all just seem like such weak reasons to hate it so much.
(only putting this in spoilers to cut down on the length of the post)

1: The graphics thing. The graphics were "downgraded" between the game's initial showing at E3 2012 and the final release. To this, I say "who the fuck cares this much about graphics?" If you look up comparison pictures, it isn't like the character models have been downgraded or that there's less detail or anything like that... Ubisoft removed a special bloom lighting effect that initially made it look a little nicer, but was apparently problematic on consoles.
People are complaining about a loss of fancy blurring.
Not a good reason to hate something.

2: People hate the main character, Aiden. A subjective thing, sure, but the complaints I've read basically boil down to the idea that he's not a straight-and-narrow "good" guy. Why is it that people are so resistant to videogame protagonists having flaws, and not always being the knight in shining armor? I understand it when the character is a massive fratboy-esque douchebag and the game forces you to do shitty things to people with no way around it (like torturing an innocent guy as Trevor in GTAV, or just generally being Kratos in God of War; both of those characters suck). But Aiden is nothing like that. People complain because he's selfish. Because he's revenge-focused. Because he blames other people for his problems. Are these really reasons to hate the game as a whole? The story pretty much brings focus to the fact that he's not always right. It's a part of the story. If this were a movie or a book, no one would bat an eye, but because we play as him, suddenly people can't stand a story like that.
So again, not a good reason to hate it.

3: People claim that the driving sucks, that the cars control like they're "trying to get traction on ice."
To this one: wha-huh?
I have never before in my entire life had so much goddamn fun engaging in car chases in an open-world videogame. This is easily my favorite game for getting into car chases. Luring other cars into hack-based traps, whipping down alleyways, dropping down into parking garages, fishtailing around corners and genuinely trying to avoid hitting pedestrians (since you're playing as a vigilante)... it's all an absolute blast, seriously more so than I've ever experienced in any GTA entry.
So this complaint... I just don't get. Like, at all.

Those are the three most common complaints I've read people say about the game, and absolutely none of it bothers me in the least. I'm busy focusing on everything the game does well.
Regardless of anything, the game still looks great graphically. Some say it's a bland-looking game, and I get that to an extent, but that's just Chicago. If anything, the game did a wonderful job of recreating the look and feel of the city it's based in. That's a good thing.
As mentioned, I think the driving is great, but the game is also an excellent stealth-em-up/cover shooter. The stealth is just about the most solid bit of sneaking I've ever experienced in an open-world setting. It's simple line of sight stuff, but it thrives on viewing the world through cameras and creating distractions to get around safely. It's excellent. and when things go loud, the shooting is just as fun. Enemies only take a couple hits to take down, but the protagonist is almost just as delicate. Taking cover is absolutely essential, and it makes for a really nice level of challenge. And best of all, the game allows you to combine the stealth and shooting in the best way I've ever seen. You can exchange gunfire with enemies, then sneak around behind obstacles and they'll totally lose track of you. Just putting it into words, it doesn't sound all that extraordinary, but it really is the best implementation of this style of AI that I've ever played, even more so than MGSV (which also did it well). It actually combines stealth with all-out chaos, and it works.
This is getting long in the tooth, so I'll just run down all the good shit: even if you don't like Aiden, the game has some really great, extremely well-acted characters (Jordi Chin is fucking amazing and deserves his own game), the only problem being that you just don't get to see enough of them.
The side-activities are without a doubt the best I've ever seen in a game of this type. It skips cliche shit like tennis or golf in favor of chess challenges (very smart puzzle stuff) and what the game calls Digital Trips (hallucinations which put you in crazy situations outside of the game's otherwise "realistic" setting; there's a stealth survival horror game, a hellish Carmageddon-style game, something ridiculous where you bounce on flowers in a psychedelic haze, and a game where you control a giant, killer spider-tank). The Digital Trips are a huge part of why I love the game so much as a whole, honestly.
The story is actually very smart, and smartly-paced at that. The very fact that the whole thing starts with Aiden catching the shooter that sent him down a path of revenge is a testament to that. It's a revenge story, sure, but the trail from one plot point to the next is very natural, and the world that it creates along the way is certainly intriguing.
And finally, whatever anyone else might say, the hacks that you can perform throughout the whole thing really give it a different flavor, whether it's while driving or on-foot. Crashing cars into barriers, blowing up steam pipes beneath them, creating distractions on enemies' phones, tapping into people's phone calls, effing with traffic lights, and (my favorite) causing a complete power shutdown at night are all a damn blast to do. No other game is quite like the experience this one gives off.

And as an outer shell, the fact that the game is about a straight-up vigilante -- not Batman or some superhero, but a guy with a tactical baton, some guns, and some hacking skills -- is pure toughguy wish-fulfillment for me. I downright love this kind of stuff, and weirdly there just isn't much of it in the videogame realm. I love a good sense of context, and this one has great context.

Bad Blood, the DLC, actually surprised the hell out of me too. I just expected more of the same, and to a degree that's really what it is, but it feels very much like they managed to push the whole concept even further toward its potential while working within the confines of the already-established game engine and setup. There are some really nifty ideas in place, particularly things that affect the side-activities (raiding gang hideouts, completing driving missions), and it shows a nice little evolution, a nice sense of where the series could go from here (assuming it becomes a series).
Have to say, being that it was primarily made by Ubisoft's Paris office, the art design is certainly flashier and more interesting than the main game. I've always felt like the French tend to have a certain flair for visuals in gaming (just look at the works of Michel Ancel, Dontnod's work on Remember Me, Eric Chahi's Another World/Out of this World, all that stuff), and it certainly shows here. Much more vibrant use of color in all of the DLC's unique locations. Might also have something to do with the fact that they do a lot more with the blackhat hacker/DJ Defalt than the main game does, and he's a really fun character in his own right, probably my favorite in Watch_Dogs overall, just after Jordi.
I'll just leave this here. Love the way some of this stuff looks.

[Axm]

Halo 5

Graphics

Not leaps and bounds over Halo 4 but 5 is great looking and runs at a silky smooth 60fps.
In multiplayer is where the frame rate helps tremendously.

Sound

Standard Halo affair, which is to say top tier and crispy classic sound effects.

Gameplay

The gameplay is naturally where this game shines. The new jetpack movement is natural feeling and lends to the multiplayer in not only a powerful feeling way but also in a balanced fair way. Gunplay is spectacular. Honestly this is the best playing Halo game since 2 and it now surpasses 2 in every way.
Multiplayer is probably the best fair and balance competitive experience ive ever played before. This is now by far the best multiplayer console shooter available.
With exception to more and better maps that will become available in the future, its so close to perfection..
Just a few tiny little tweaks here and there like with one of the grenade types, but if nothing was ever changed it would still be fine.
One noteable thing is the lack of splitscreen support for a second player... in a Halo game this is a big surprise for some, for me it makes no difference but for others I can see the outrage over it.

Story

I've never really cared about the Halo story, but regardless, as a story no matter if you know the Halo universe or not, the story is complete hot garbage here. Decent plot but lackluster execution and a overall let down in what it could have been. And also its a pretty short campaign.
Commander Locke is a stale character who follows orders for no other reason than for the sake of following orders. He lends nothing to the already stale Master Chief.
They make you play as this guy for 80% of the game with his equally stale squad.
He's like a worse version of MGS2 Raiden. Even comparing him to MGS2 Raiden is too much credit for him.
Nah, he's more like a character out of Killzone or Call of Duty.

Overall its now my favorite Halo game for multiplayer.
Better then Halo 1 and 2 imo. And those games are amazing to me.
Story is hot garbage, but it makes no difference to the core game and where the real replay value is.

5/5
Perhaps my GOTY. I still have to play a couple other games but so far its GOTY.

If you want to play this for the single player campaign you are wasting your money.
If you want to play this for the online multiplayer you are spending the best time and money in the last 10 years.

[Mr357]

Policenauts



Not quite as good as Snatcher in my opinion, but still a great detective-style graphic adventure with lots of classic Kojima quirks and fourth wall breakers. I imagine someone who's into anime, and specifically the older style with more crude animation than what's seen today, would really enjoy this one. The entire game, whether you're in a cutscene or interactive part, is rich in that 80's and early 90's style of drawing. The gameplay was expanded upon in comparison to Snatcher, and required the player to select things they wanted to interact with with a cursor, instead of simply listing all available options. Some of the shooting sequences (especially near the end) were a huge pain in the ass to try to pass with WASD, but never did I feel like quitting. Policenauts was fun, interesting, and challenging without leaving me lost or frustrated too much.

8.5/10

[Axm]

Telltale's Game of Thrones

Graphics/Art

Although certain locations are less beautiful than others, out of all the telltale games out there this one has some of the most beautiful artistic areas. Graphically its no different then any of the other games though. But who plays these games for graphical fidelity anyways right?

Sound/Music
Really great score throughout the game ofcourse using music from the TV series. But per-usual on console, sound dropping out for a second during actions scenes are still common place.

Story

After The Walking Dead games, this is by far now my next favorite story that Telltale has done. The Wolf Amoung Us was also fantastic but GoT does a great job at giving you huge choices to make, maybe even to a higher degree then TWD has done.
The characters are all very well voice acted. All have unique personalities that grow on you through effective backstory telling and conversations. Some of the characters I really felt strong emotions for in the end.

Gameplay

Standard affair. Nothing new here. In the end though, theirs nothing wrong with it but I can tell you after playing every telltale game made so far I am getting slightly tired of the same unoptimized engine in the console versions. Frequent stutters are still present in this game too. Frame dropping is just an expectation now.


In the end its a great game. I recommend everyone who likes Telltale to play this game. Especially make priority of it over Telltale's Borderlands game.

4/5

[Monkei]

^ I'm glad you're pretty alone with that weird opinion about Tales from the Borderlands.

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/game-of-thrones-a-telltale-games-series

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/tales-from-the-borderlands-a-telltale-game-series

[Axm]

Not such a big difference in scoring there..
also lol at using metacritic to try and prove a point.

You do realize metacritic creates an aggregate scoring based off different scoring methods and that not everyone's idea of a number is the same definition? Is a "C" really = ~70 if the website considers that a "good" score comparred to another site that gives a 3/5 and considers that "average"? How you do then compute words into numbers and make a fair scoring out of that?
Is a 7/10 fair, average, good or decent? Do people want to play a "decent" game or a good game? Ah.. lets call 7/10 "good" and 6/10 fair? Ah but 6/10 for some people means "poor".. so lets change that...
See what I mean? It's all a matter of opinion.

Using metacritic is like trying to combine scoring systems for different sports all together into one score. It just doesn't compute properly. Metacritic creates these "averages" based on a formula that tries to fit not only a square peg in a round hole, but a star, oval, triangle and all the other shapes all into one.. It's nonsense and that site and others like it really annoy me when people look at them as the end all be all to the "right" opinion to prove something to someone.

Also if you want to compare just user scores which use the same scoring system then you have to factor in all the idiots who put in 0/10 or 10/10 based on how much they hate it no matter what the circumstances or are wearing fanboy goggles and its the second coming of Christ. That scoring is an even bigger joke.

Personally I like using 5/5 scoring cause I think in 10/10 scoring anything 1-5 is a complete waste of numbers.
But that's just my opinion.

Focus on an individual site that you like, then focus even harder on what reviewer might share your opinion on other games in general.. and then maybe in the end you have a number in your own mind based off your opinion that would make a fair score.. which will never ever be spot on regardless because people are not calculators.
Judging by your super unbiased Borderlands avatar it seems you're not a calculator either.

/rant
(thanks I got to kill some time at work with that)

[Monkei]

It doesn't really matter what you think of the metascore system - you can still scroll past that score and have a look at the whole of all reviews taken into account, which will still undermine the point that you're rightfully and luckily pretty alone with your odd 2/5 rating for Tales from the Borderlands.

[Thief]

I prefer a recommend or don't recommend "scoring" method. The numbers are arbitrary anyway.