Recent reviews by Cinos Ruddertail

This game is delightfully hot and naughty in all the right ways. The combat's fun enough, even if not super deep, and there's stats and all so you can play in a variety of ways. The story has some potential to be interesting in a way that combines the lewd and serious aspects.

However. It's pre-alpha. It's been pre-alpha for god knows how many years now, and the pace of development is glacial. There are bugs, quite a lot of bugs, ranging from quest markers that don't disappear, to being stuck underwater while rowing your boat, to being stuck opening a chest, and my favorite: fatal error crashes.

The thing is, there's nothing quite like this one out there. So this recommendation really depends on 1) if you expect development to ever pick up and go somewhere at a faster speed than maybe three new scenes a year and 2) your tolerance for pre-alpha bugs.

A weak yes, half because I really want to support and normalize more games like this that have actual gameplay while not shying away from being as explicit as it gets.

Hope you enjoy laser crossing/blocking/intereference puzzles 'cause if you get this DLC you're in for a lot of that. Interference upon interference. Several new mechanics are introduced but not explained at all, and while some (connectors weakening laser strength) are easy to figure out, others like cycling blocked lasers still don't really make any sense to me.

It's not all bad though. As always the game is stunningly beautiful in every aspect. The voice acting, the philosophy, the environments, the music. And there are puzzles I enjoy in there too, they're just kind of in the minority.

Unfortunately there isn't much of a story. The first part is quite touching. The second part is... not much of anything. The third is a rehash of ideas that we already went through in the base game. It's a shame, because a captivating story like TP1/RtG/TP2 really motivates me to solve puzzles that I might not otherwise enjoy. The second part is especially guilty of it; you're solving puzzles because there are puzzles, and that's stated outright. It's just not my thing. And that brings us full circle to those "puzzles I don't like" with a little caveat.

I don't like type of puzzles that seem to be majority in this one, but if you do - and particularly, if you enjoy the kind of solutions that feel unintentional/glitchy while being the intended solution, you might be very into this. If you also don't need a strong story, it's definitely for you. But for me, this is the weakest part of all of these games, which is a shame. I really wanted to like it!

It's the same classic game it ever was. Little more needs to be said; it's one of the best games ever with a shiny new coat of paint. If you haven't played it, play it.

This is absolutely a worthwhile remake and all. It's faithful where it needs to be and cuts/adds things where needed in equal measure. I recommend it.

Now that said, the Xen chapters are just miserable. They just keep going. Forever. The same puzzles are repeated way too many times and it gets boring. In the end, it's not enough to make my recommendation budge, and they do look good, but sometimes less really is more. Much more.

So, honestly, this is very, very mediocre. It has some upsides that might make it worth it for you, but for me it just isn't enough. Let's do a quick summary:

Pro: The environment is incredibly beautiful. One of the best I've ever seen rendered in a video game. It's so vivid that you can just about feel the wind and smell the flowers. It's stunning, and absolutely worth just lingering in.

Con: However, trying to navigate that beautiful nature via anything except the roads - which are boring - is an exercise in frustration and if a road doesn't lead to a location, there's nothing there.

Pro: The story starts off really engaging with plenty of motivation and mystery.

Con: And then it drops off into almost nothing as you just kill dude after dude with very little connection to the actual story, to the point of tedium, and the ending has been saved for DLC.

Pro: Having two protagonists is great for making the game a little more varied and exciting.

Con: But both protagonists are so overpowered that they can effortlessly beat any combat encounter with zero challenge, so in the end you're basically just picking by aesthetics.

Pro: The stealth gameplay is great! Sneaking around is very satisfying and fun, planning approaches in castles and cities is exciting, and learning how to evade the guards is pretty thrilling.

Con: Sadly the castles are very, very similar, and there are so many of them that even the exciting stealth starts wearing thin and you just rush through it to get the loot at the end. Would it have killed Ubisoft to make something other than a castle? How about an entire village of hostiles? Anything? No?

And so it goes. The game does a lot extremely well, but sadly there's always something to ruin the fun to some degree. The missing ending is the biggest offense, and then there's totally wasted stuff like the battle pass, which just a way to get you returning to the game weekly to get terribly mediocre loot.

I can't recommend it at this price, Half off, maybe. Or a month of Ubisoft plus. For anything more than that, just go play Odyssey for your AC RPG fix, honestly.

Oblivion as you remember it being, rather than how it was. Yes, I recommend it, especially at this price and including the DLC. For me, it also runs great, but I've heard people have performance issues so be mindful of that just in case.

A rather delightful game! If you've played Zero Dawn, you know roughly what to expect. It's more of the same; more expansive world and more activities, more variation for combat, and of course better graphics. The story isn't quite as punchy as the first since the big reveal came and went, but it's good enough. There are some flaws here; too much knockdown in combat, too much grind to upgrade weapons... but overall I had a fantastic time for most of my 111 hours.

That said, i do hope the third installment innovates a little more. I don't think I could do a third game that's "more of the same" without any particularly fascinating plot hooks.

Would not recommend for less than three players. It's simply not balanced around duos, not even in the "2-3 person ship". Want to know why? Because with only two players, you basically have to both stay on the ship to defend it (one to fly, other to shoot) and you can't do objectives while enemies are active because they'll shoot right through walls to nuke you even inside structures. How about bots if you're going to have mechanics like that? How about give the pilot turrets in the smaller ships? Are we flying a sailboat that's only capable of broadsides?

It's also too focused on gear over skill, the basic turrets do damn near nothing at all. I'd recommend a more Sea Of Thieves style approach where equipment matters little or not at all, because the early peashooters are infuriating to even touch and will absolutely make people ragequit forever.

Immaculate atmosphere. Spooky as heck. Same heavy story, now with bonus endings to really drive that home...

...serviceable combat, but I think I speak for all of us when I say screw the mannequins, holy crap. There's too much combat compared to the original. It's changes the vibe a lot, though I'm not totally sure if it's worse across the board for it. Rather, it's different.

But aside from that, it's amazing, deeply beautiful in its own dark, dismal way, and way longer than the original, and to top it off it doesn't seem to lose the quality touch at any given point. An almost perfect, and very worthy remake, that runs perfectly for me. No technical issues.

Ehh. It's really hard not to recommend this because it's so cute, wholesome, and well-meaning... and cheap, but there really isn't that much story or anything here. The original chapter - One Night, Hot Springs - is a pretty good piece about what it's like to be transgender (in Japan, in particular), but the other two chapters honestly don't add much. Like, at all. There are some cute moments, but there have been better games about all these issues, if you ask me.

I'd give a neutral review because it didn't do much for me personally, but that's not an option so instead I'll recommend it, because if you're totally unfamiliar with the struggles trans people and women might face, it's a good... introduction, I suppose. And the art style is very cute. It serves a good purpose. But there's not much meat on the bones.