Review: Chivalry Medieval Warfare (3/5)

This is a fairly cheap game that is pretty bare bones. It's a multiplayer medieval combat hack and slash game. There is no single player except a short tutorial.

Things I liked:
-Simple and easy to understand combat system that had more depth than just button mashing that makes gameplay addicting and fun.
-Variety of game modes and classes with different abilities and weapons keeps gameplay interesting.
-Hilarious the way the bodies get dismembered and how you can make your character shout before going into battle. Game just ends up feeling sort of wacky.

Things I didn't like:
-Dated graphics can be slightly distracting.
-Combat can get repetitive fairly quickly.
-I believe there are rewards like new weapons from leveling up and playing more but that was never made clear.

Chivalry is a fun, simple, and relatively cheap game that I think is totally worth picking up, especially if you can get it on sale.

Hours played: 2
Final score: 3/5

Review: Dishonored (2/5)

When I first saw the trailers for Dishonored it looked like a cool environment, but I thought it still looked like just another action game. When the reviews came out though it seemed very well rated so I thought I'd reconsider. In Dishonored you play Lord Corvo, the protector of the Empress, who is framed for killing her and must take his revenge. The world is loosely industrial revolution themed with different science based on whale oil. Magic also plays a role but it's not known about by the common man. The game is a first person hybrid between stealth and combat with some minor RPG elements in picking your powers.

Things I liked:
-Interesting and unique environment and theme.
-Missions had a good variety of ways to play through them and felt very open.
-I enjoyed the unique spells such as possession and rat swarm, and I especially liked the blink spell. I love teleporting in games.

Things I didn't like:
-Combat grew stale quickly. Lack of variety in enemies early on bored me.
-Often felt like I had too many options. Between all the weapons and powers it was too hard to decide the best way to dispatch enemies.
-Stealth mechanics were interesting, but it seemed like I wasn't punished enough for getting caught. I played on hard difficulty and I could often just stand up and kill everyone or blink away onto a roof until they forgot about me.
-The game made too many compromises between stealth and combat, resulting in neither gameplay option being as good as they could have been.
-The plot was unique enough, but too predictable and not very exciting.

I'm going against the grain here by disagreeing with most reviewers but I thought Dishonored was nothing special and felt like just another action game. The plot, environment, and themes had a lot of potential but were lacking in execution. I wouldn't recommend it.

Hours played: 8
Final score: 2/5

Review: Tropico 4 (4/5)

I wasn't expecting that much from this game going into it because it was only sort of well reviewed on Metacritic and was fairly unheard of. My friend Zac had recommended it ages ago, and well the steam holiday sale was going on so I thought "no way this is as good as SimCity but I'll give it a shot." Well I was wrong. It is as good as SimCity, if not better. They are fairly different games at the end of the day though mostly because of Tropico's setting. You are a dictator of your own little island and you can control every aspect of it from building things to politics.You can also issue edicts such as "Contraception Ban," improving your respect with the religious faction, but lowering it from other factions. There's also ways to interact with foreign powers by doing things like trade missions with the US or USSR that will make one like you more and the other less.

Things I liked:

• Great sense of humor, lots of hilarious jokes and jabs about dictators and communism
• Good variety of buildings
• Campaign mode is quite long and kept missions varied, interesting, and funny with different scenarios (I only got about halfway through)
• Islands varied in difficulty based on the amount of resources available and frequency of natural disasters. 
• No zones mechanic like in SimCity. I really like how I get to choose exactly what to build, although this can lead to tedious micromanaging at times. 

Things I didn't like:

• Organization of building menu was often confusing and the interface and controls could've been a bit better. 
• How to use some buildings and edicts was often not explained well
• Normal speed is too slow. Fortunately there are 2 and 3x speed settings. Unfortunately these are both often still too slow. I always played at 3x. 
• Missing some useful mechanics like being able to upgrade several buildings at once or building wider roads for more traffic. Traffic was often a problem on my islands.

Hours Played: 25

Final Score: 4/5

Review: Prototype 2 (1/5)

You know I feel like I haven't reviewed enough games I didn't like. Here's one though. Instead of buying Prototype 2 just go ahead and buy the original Prototype. It was a very fun game with a decent plot. I was hoping the sequel would be like the first one and just be more of the same kind of free form gameplay. And it was, but it was almost exactly the same. In the few hours I spent with the game I felt as if they had added nothing to the gameplay, and even somehow made it worse. In addition to that the plot didn't seem to make very much sense and was pretty boring. The plot in the first one was a fairly simple zombie kind of story but it had some unique points and it was told in an exciting way. They tried to do the same thing in Prototype 2 but it really didn't work out. Don't buy this game. If you are interested in the gameplay style just buy the original Prototype. I never wrote a review for it but I'd give it 3/5.

Final Score: 1/5

Review: Dear Esther (4/5)

Dear Esther is a very controversial game. I heard about it when it was on sale during the Steam Summer Sale (you may have noticed I bought quite a few games at this point. The deals are just too good). It was up for $2.50 and now is still only $10 so it's quite cheap. I'm not going to go into the same likes/dislikes format I've been doing lately because I don't want to get too specific about the game. It is an adventure for you to explore.

It is a very unique indie game. There's no shooting or sprinting or interacting or anything really. You just move, look, and listen. It sounds boring, but the game tells a deep and compelling story. I felt as if I was investigating something, but I wasn't sure what it was. Even after finishing the game I'm not sure what I've discovered. It sounds corny, but the game really makes you think. The game is technically an open world of an island for you to explore and listen to narration, so you can sort of go wherever you want. Actually though the game ends up being mostly linear, but I always felt as if I wanted to go the same way the game wanted me to go to continue. It wasn't like in most games where I felt forced to go to the next "checkpoint." There is no map with waypoints telling me where to go. I was just drawn in by the environment and moved where I needed to. I'm still not even sure if the game is linear though. Perhaps if I play it again I could take another route and get to the same place. Or a different place? The game really makes me feel in control. Also, the environment is beautiful. Even if there were no story just walking around the island would be exciting and interesting.

Overall this game is fascinating. I would definitely pay more than $10 for it, but it really is only $10! I highly recommend it as it is a unique take on video games with a compelling story and beautiful environment. I warn you though: you must be prepared to play a game like this. It is almost like a movie. It only ends up taking about an hour and the replay value is likely minimal (I have not played through again but I've heard the game rearranges stories and you can walk different routes). In the end though, I felt it was a deep and meaningful experience that was well worth my time and money. You just have to decide if that is the type of game you'd want to try.

Final Score: 4/5