ZTGD's Reviews
Unravel is disappointing on several levels, simply because it rarely steps outside the box mechanically to deliver a fun or interesting experience. The narrative is what drives the game, and even some of that feels obtuse at times. I wanted to love Yarny and his adventures, but the game wrapped around it is simply mediocre in design to the point that as brief as the journey was, I simply wasn't having fun pushing through it, which is sad because Yarny appears to have more heart than most bigger-budget games.
For the 15th anniversary and the first Digimon game to be released in the west in over seven years, the fans deserved better than the localization effort put forth here. Still, despite these issues, the core gameplay remains strong and stands as a fun game to play- just not to read.
Sometimes a game comes along that sees a team of people coming together to create something unique and scary all the same. That's Layers of Fear in a nutshell and it scared the living hell out of me.
Project X Zone 2 is a deeper, more satisfying experience as it is greatly improved from the original in every single way. It's a shrine to a great cast of characters we've grown fond of over the years, carefully crafted by people who love these characters just as much as we do.
Dying Light The Following is a decent length expansion that will last players around ten hours and adds a nice little chunk to the core gameplay that can extend the overall package of Dying Light, even with newer features in the be the zombie mode also.
Arslan is a warrior's game and its roots are obvious. The fact that it is extremely story driven though, really gives me a sense to keep moving forward and I constantly found myself playing "just one more battle". It's not changing up the formula that much and that's fine in my opinion, but the story hook was there.
XCOM 2 does everything Enemy Unknown did and improved on it with more variations as well as some very interesting game mechanics. Anyone who enjoyed the first game has no reason not to pick this one up. It has a few performance issues here and here, but it is still a challenging yet rewarding game that made me have every emotion from joyous to devastated. One of the early game of the year contenders for me, and a fine game any strategy fan should own.
While sparse on content, the actual fighting of Nitroplus Blasterz is surprisingly deep and enjoyable. Fighting game fans that usually scoff at these types of games should definitely check it out. It has been a nice title to tide me over until Capcom unleashes the big guns this month. I will likely come back to this game over time, as it is super easy to pick up and play; and most importantly it is easy to have fun.
Megadimension Neptunia VII is a bubbly game that I could easily see getting worn out with its abundance of releases. However, coming into it as a new player I really enjoyed the ride. There is a ton of content, fan service, and solid RPG mechanics to make it entertaining, if not a bit too cute for my own tastes. I have zero clues what happened in the story; as I said coming in on a conversation I missed three quarters of, but I still was able to appreciate the genuine humor in the writing.
Firewatch left me both disappointed but also pleased. The system performance on PS4 is a bummer and I can overlook it, as this is a game about its story and choices in dialog, so performance never affected my input to the gameplay. It just simply feels rough around the edges and it shows. Meanwhile, as hyped as I was for this and I can't really explain this as doing so would spoil elements of the story, but things were not as I expected, and while it's refreshing, sometimes elements feel like a cop out or as I said earlier, a red herring and that doesn't always rub me personally the right way. I enjoyed my time with Firewatch and I really cared about both of these people… or characters I should say.
LEGO Marvel's Avengers still boasts enormous amounts of content, and those that have not grown tired of the formula will find plenty to justify their money. Still it feels like the series is on autopilot and with LEGO Dimensions still fresh in everyone's mind it can be hard to justify spending another full sticker price for what feels like a rehash.
The DLC isn't the best I've played but it's not the worst, it got me really excited, but then was over before I knew it.
Low replay value aside this is an enjoyable romp, granted you have the patience and skills to finish these treacherous castles.
Despite these flaws, Final Fantasy Explorers offers a good time with friends taking on iconic enemies from the FF universe- just don't expect much of a challenge.
If you have any interest in logic puzzles and want to explore a pretty interesting world, the Witness is a must own.
I cannot recommend this game enough if things like Transformers, G.I. Joe, and He-Man make you smile. This game will have you grinning ear-to-ear from start to finish.
The game play is not going to blow anyone away, but it was interesting enough to keep me entertained for long enough to get my money's worth out of it.
[H]aving played many dual-stick shooters in the past, there is nothing really here that stands out as excellent. Just average.
I loved my time with the original release and I soon found myself loving it all over again on PC. Rise of the Tomb Raider continues improving upon the new formula that was created in the last game, but here we feel that Lara really is becoming a tomb raider.
Those looking for something new and exciting definitely need to give this a shot now that it has a second chance.