Seasons After Fall (Xbox One) Review

There’s never enough time in the day when you want to play a game but must parent, too.  Thankfully, there’s a bountiful market of indie games that appeal to someone looking for something quick and fun. In a world where artistic platforming indie games are a dime a dozen, Seasons After Fall has appeal if you’re looking for something short.  I was fortunate enough to get it on sale as part of a double pack, and decided it was time to give it a try.  It’s a pretty game, with a distinct art style, a clear plot, and easy play mechanics.  That’s what makes it a good choice for someone without a lot of time.

The first thing you’ll notice is the art style.  It looks like oil painting over hand-drawn scenery and characters.  It's nice.  Everything was uniformly presented, with nothing so obviously different that it took away from the main art style.  Nothing is more distracting when playing a game than a random object drawn in a different style.  The only complaint I can make about the game’s art is its tendency to place a plethora of objects in the foreground.  I don't like things obscuring my view of the character while I'm trying to control it, and they disrupt my immersion in the story.

The second thing that drew my attention was the story.  When starting out, you possess a small fox.  Urged on by a mysterious spirit, you set out to find the guardian of winter to gain its power and find out more about your purpose.  You jump around, but there are no complicated puzzles to solve until you earn the power of the first season, winter.  Of course, it doesn't take long before you get your second and further seasonal powers, and the game opens up. 

I say "opens up", but the second half of the game is still rather linear.  In the first half, you are required to earn the four seasons, in order.  Once that is complete, you move on to the second half, where you then free the four respective stones, and rebuild their power altars.  The first stone, like the power, is winter.  After that, you are free to do the other stones, and then the altars, in whatever order you want.  Previous areas don’t change, but more sections of them are available as you gain new powers. This helps keep the game short.  There are a couple of new areas added, and one is a big pain in the butt.  

Lastly, let’s talk about gameplay.  The mechanics are simple, but you can apply them in multiple ways.  For example, winter freezes water, which allows you to walk on it.  Summer is dry, and thirsty plants drink up the water, lowering its level.  Then there are more unique applications.  Fall winds can blow leaves and fog, while spring rains can make plants grow and help raise water levels.  The seasons can also affect the few creatures you encounter, which helps you to solve puzzles.  

Puzzles in the game are not overly complicated.  Until you get the second power, puzzles are either "use winter" or "turn off winter."  You may still get stuck, but every solution is close by, and rarely involves more than knowing what each season does.  Considering the limited list of effects, it shouldn’t be too difficult, even for casual gamers.  The platform jumping also isn’t very strenuous, which is a plus.  The simplicity makes for a relaxing experience for most of the game. 

You might think this sounds involved, but the entire game is only a few hours long.  It can be stretched out if you don’t do the stone and altar objectives at the same time, or if you go back for the collectible flowers.  Doing so doesn't add much time, but it's pretty much all you have for replay.  There isn't much in the way of extra content.

Overall, Seasons After Fall was a decent gaming experience.  When all is said and done, it's a standard indie game: artistic visuals, average platforming, short length, and a dose of charm.  A fun game, but not outstanding.  There just isn’t anything about it that makes it something to go out of your way (or out of your budget) to buy.

The Good:

Artwork is pretty and changing the seasons for puzzles and platforming is fun.  Controls are simple and effective.

The Bad:

Artistic objects can interfere in platforming.  Elements of the seasons could be deeper.  Not a lot of extra content.

The SaHD:

Argh, no double jump!

(Seasons After Fall was purchased by the reviewer)

(Expertly edited by Handy Edits)

Ghostbusters: The Video Game Remastered (Switch) Review

Everything old is new again.  Ten years ago, Atari published the Ghostbusters video game, reuniting the original cast to voice their respective parts, craft an original story continued from the movies, and was even written by Harold Ramis and Dan Aykroyd.   Originally released 20 years after the second movie, the game has now been remastered on the eve of 35 years of the franchise.

While it's not as exciting to me as an Ecto-1 themed Transformer, I was eager to play the game again. I bought and still own the original on my Xbox 360.  Why not try it again with a shiny, new coat of paint?  For better or worse, that's what this "Remastered" is.  It looks nicer, but no other additions are present.  No new levels, modes, or anything like that.  On the contrary, the buggy multiplayer mode has been cut out entirely.  According this article, it should eventually be patched in after being re-built from the ground up, but it's certainly not there yet.

The gameplay is the same as the original release, but since I haven't reviewed that, I will cover it here.  You are the newest Ghostbuster, and must join forces with them to...what else, bust some ghosts.  The game dubs this as "zap 'em, cap 'em, and trap 'em", which is fairly accurate.  For the ghost enemies, you must start by zapping them with your proton stream or one of the other 3 weapon types.  Some are more suceptible to the different attack types than others, but the basic gist is to hit them and do damage.  Once their "health" is down enough, you can capture them with the proton stream.  A trap is thrown out, and the ghost must be lead into it.  Ghosts struggle while being captured.  Slamming them around will stun them and make it easier.  Despite the proton stream being appropriately inaccurate, the whole thing feels very satisfying.

That's all well and good, but the game isn't perfect.   While trapping ghosts can be fun, it can be a bit much when fighting multiple at a time, or some of the more annoying enemies.  It's very easy to get blindsided by something off-screen, or not be able to actually use the dodge move to get out of the way.   Many hits will knock you on the ground for a few seconds, leaving you unable to do anything.  Yes, the games around that time loved to make you ragdoll for some reason.

Another thing that was super popular to do in games around that time was not give a health bar.  Part of the "hud-less" craze, you won't know your exact health in Ghostbusters.  There's a tiny meter on the side of your proton pack, coupled with the growing red border of the screen, to give you a general idea of how you are doing.   It's not the biggest help, considering how quickly you can get downed, even on the "normal" setting.   Plus, the AI goes down even quicker, and isn't the best at helping you up. It's easy to get a "game over", sending you back to the nearest checkpoint.  That isn't the worst punishment for losing, but there could definitely be better placed checkpoints.

As is customary in video games then and nowadays, you can upgrade the different functions of your loadout.  It's not too involved, as each function only has 2-4 different upgrades, and each of those only has 1 upgrade.   For example, some attack types can be upgraded to reduce the heat gain from using it, or increase the damage.  The trap even has a few upgrades to it.   To get the money for upgrades, you simply need to advance through the game, and trap ghosts.  You should get enough to fully upgrade by the end, so there's no grinding.

While the gameplay is a mix of fun with some aggravation, the story is solid.  Written as a psuedo-replacement for the third movie, it actually fits the bill.  There's even reasons to have iconic locations and characters return, just so fans can experience them.  Re-hashing encounters with Stay Puft and the Grey Lady (librarian ghost) wouldn't do in a theater setting, but should put a smile on the face of long-time fans.  To top it off, the original cast is back to voice their own lines.  It's not necessarily the best voice acting ever, but it's good and authentic.  Characters talk and act like themselves, mostly because they are themselves.  Although some of the chatter is repeated too much, especially when you aren't the fastest at an objective, there is plenty of humor in the writing.

Overall thoughts on the game?  Mostly positive.  The core "zap 'em, cap'em & trap 'em" gameplay is fun and satisfying, even if several fights are not.   Dialogue and story scenes are the highlight, being written and performed by the iconic Ghostbusters themselves.   Multiplayer is absent, but will likely not be missed by many, even if it does eventually get patched in.  This game is worth playing for Ghostbusters fans.  If you already played the original release, I'd only recommend coming back if you really enjoyed it.  Otherwise, there's nothing new to entice you.


The Good:
Story, characters, and strapping on the pack to bust some ghosts with the original cast.

The Bad:
Get downed too quickly, annoying to fight too many enemies at once.

The SaHD:
Busting makes me feel good!

(Review code for Ghostbusters was received from the publisher.)

Lococycle (Xbox One) Review

Remember Lococycle?  Originally announced as an Xbox 360 arcade title, it first debuted on the Xbox One during the launch window.  I remember it being pushed by Microsoft for a bit, until it released to less than stellar reviews.

Fast forward a few years, and the game was given away with the Games with Gold program.  I finally decided to sit down and play it, mostly because I remember it not being a very long game.  Or maybe it would be bad enough that I wouldn't care to play it ever again.  One way or another, I was going to knock it off of my list of games to play.

Lococycle stars sentient weapon-slash-motorcycle IRIS.  After being given life like Johnny 5, she takes her unwitting mechanic Pablo on a trip to Scottsburg, Indiana.  A top level and expensive weapon escaping from a billion-dollar arms dealer?  What could possibly go wrong on their route?  Obviously, it is a lot.  The game and story are over the top, but I sure didn't expect it to begin with, and feature, live-action cut scenes.  The acting, locations, situations and voice acting are all really good.  In fact, they are likely the high point of the game.

IRIS and Pablo go racing toward their destination, but the game isn't really a racing game.  It's pretty much on rails, with you fighting various bad guy troops.  You will need to steer clear of attacks and other vehicles.  This is much harder than it should be, because the steering sensitivity is way too high.  Trying to make a minor correction frequently resulted in me over-steering, hitting something or other in the process.

IRIS is far from defenseless, using her machine guns, grenade launcher, and even martial arts training to fight back.  Yes, you read that right.  There is plenty of melee combat in the game.  While silly, it's my preferred way to fight.  She has a normal attack, and a stronger attack where she throws Pablo out like a boomerang.  She can also dash to other enemies as she flies through the air attacking them, and even counter many of their assaults.  IRIS' health isn't great for many parts of the game, so countering correctly is crucial to survival.  Thankfully the game is usually generous about the timing.

As mentioned before, there will be shooting sections.  Very few sections will have you use her side-mounted grenade launcher, but there will be plenty of times when you shoot her front-mounted machine guns.  These are fairly effective at taking out bad guys, especially when upgraded.  It can be very hard to aim at some cars because the road isn't always straight.  Trying to aim while winding back and forth is annoying.  This is the time the overly sensitive steering would be welcome, but that is toned down a lot while you are actively shooting.  It just feels backwards.

To mix things up, there are also some sections and boss fights that take the game in new directions.  One may be a third person shooter, another may be a mini-game to fix IRIS before a train hits you.  There are also a lot of QTE bits thrown in.  These tend to be fairly inoffensive, but I suspect they are there to pad out the gameplay and length.  The worst of these sections is the Street Fighter-like boss fight.  I would give them a bonus point for the background, but that fight is so bad that I won't.  First off, the two characters have actual Street Fighter special moves.  Trouble is, there isn't a move list, and I only found two of IRIS'.  The opponent has Blanka's Electricity, Dhalsim's stretchy limbs, the psycho crusher, a fireball, and the spinning lariat.  IRIS can throw a fireball, but the computer reads the input, and uses the spinning lariat to pass through it.  Every.  Time.  It's not only annoying, it's outright cheap.  You'd think they were emulating an SNK boss instead.

The levels were longer than I thought they would be, but they didn't feel too long until towards the end.  Even so, it takes less than 10 hours to beat the game.  This counts the times you will die in a level, since I found several annoying parts that were a struggle for me to beat.  There are not too many of these, provided you are using the points at the end of the stages to level up your attacks.  You can't do a lot of grinding, since beating your high score on a level will only award you points past your lower score, since you already earned those.  Therefore, the only way past those speed bumps is to get better.

After beating the game, you will have a plethora of extra points.  These can then be used to unlock a bevy of concept art, behind the scenes pictures, and videos.  There are a lot, but some of them are really interesting.  I had no idea it was that James Gunn when I saw the name, as I assumed it was a person with the same name.

Lococycle is fairly short, and offers some interesting experiences.  It's sometimes okay, and sometimes annoying, but I'd say it's worth trying a few levels if you got the game for free or cheap.


The Good:
The over the top story and mostly top-notch voice acting are entertaining.

The Bad:
Feels clunky, and some of the fights are annoying.

The SaHD:
So Pablo can detach, and there are times when IRIS isn't moving, but he decides not to escape at those times?  The story is enjoyable at times, and dumb at others.

(Lococycle was received free from the Games with Gold program on Xbox)

Overlord: Fellowship of Evil (Xbox One) Review

The first Overlord arrived on the Xbox 360, and combined action with squad management.  Using your minions for combat and puzzles was a fresh take on a third person action game.  I enjoyed it, but haven't finished it yet.  A sequel, Overlord II, was made, and then years later Fellowship of Evil released on the Xbox One and PS4.  I'd heard unflattering things about the game, but couldn't resist buying it when it had a deep discount.

Instead of the original's closer camera, FoE goes for an isometric view, more akin to Diablo.  Also unlike the original, it's a multi player experience.  Thankfully, you don't have to play it with others.  Because there are multiple people, you aren't playing as an overlord, but rather a resurrected champion of evil.  You have a normal attack, that is fast and weak, a stronger attack that can sometimes be charged, and a special attack.  The special attack requires a meter to fill beforehand, but it seems to charge rather quickly.  I first chose Malady, the dark magician, and she was pretty cool.  Her special attack was a giant laser, but I usually forgot about it since her charged strong attack was so good.

To make the game even more different than its predecessors, you will run across challenges in the various levels.  These are pretty much races, where you have to get from one point to another in a set time frame.  Little white crystals dot the route, which give you extra time if you pick them up.  I say "if" because the hit detection on them is spotty.  It might seem harsh, but these sections are dumb.  There's no other way to accurately describe it.  They aren't useful, they aren't fun, and they don't feel like they belong at all.  A few are fairly easy to win, while others are way too twisty to complete on your first try, even with Malady's teleport.  At least the only drawback to losing is not getting a random bonus to your loot at the end of the level.

In the better Overlord games, the minions were invaluable.  The damage your overlord could output was limited, and minions were expendable.  While that made the ultimate evil feel a little weak, it worked for the game type and style.  FoE goes to the opposite end.  Your chosen champion (remember, they aren't an overlord) far out damages the minions, and is probably a lot less dumb.  The minions really seem to like running into traps and dying.  If you aren't fighting something, it's easier to just recall them all, rather than lose them to their own stupidity.

In fact, the minions can be worse than not helpful, they can be detrimental.  If they touch “the golden”, they turn into enemies. So, they will try to hurt you.  If the golden is present, your minions are almost sure to run into it, meaning this is a problem you will encounter.  They aren't even good at picking up stuff for you when the loot drops.  If you didn't need the minions to solve puzzles or hurt bosses, you could easily play the whole game without them.  That's not good.

Neither is the game's performance.  Every minute or so, everything pauses for a second.  It reminds me of the similar fault in Deadpool, but I don't know if the fix is the same, or even possible.  Usually that isn't too bad, but it will queue up any button presses during that time.  I ended up summoning extra minions because of that.  Plus, that time doesn't register button holds.  Meaning, I would be trying to summon some minions, the game would lag, and I would summon all of my minions, or use my special attack.  Making a menu selection also counts as an attack, since Malady will always shoot her wand after I make one.  For some reason, unless I feather tap the A Button, she will attack twice.  The other champions don't do this.  It's pretty shoddy.

But wait!  There's more.  It's also very rough and glitchy.  I've been stuck in a treasure chest, which required going back to the hub and losing level progress.  Using Malady's blink defensive move has shot me through the ceiling, and dropped me through the floor.  The first made it impossible to finish races on time, and the second would just kill me.  Sometimes minions just die with nothing to kill them.  I've taken damage when there isn't anything around to do so.  There's even an unobtainable achievement in the Xbox One version.  Not fun.

Going through the campaign isn't too hard, or too long, thankfully.  Maxing out your minions or champion will require extra grinding.  There isn't any multiplayer exclusive content, which is good because there aren't any people playing online.  I can't blame them either.  Overlord: Fellowship of Evil isn't a good Overlord game, or even a good game period.  I got it for cheap, but even that might not be worth it.

The Good:
Can be completed in a few days, some lines are funny the first time.

The Bad:
Very rough, several glitches, and overall not good.

The SaHD:
I feel like this game spoiled the ending of the second, but that might be the least of its transgressions.

(Overlord: Fellowship of Evil was purchased by the reviewer)

Conan Exiles (Xbox One) Update

Almost a year ago, I played an early access for Conan Exiles on Xbox One.  Now, the full game has been released, and I figured I would jump back in for a few hours to see what has changed.

Wow.  First off, the game is now third person.  I think it was first person before, but I'm not 100% positive on that.  Third person makes the combat a lot easier to manage.  However, combat is still very clunky.  Aiming doesn't get thrown off by being hit anymore, but still has strict accuracy.  It's a step in the right direction, though.  The equipment wheel is still used to equip things from your inventory, like weapons.  It's still cumbersome, and takes a lot longer than I'd like to equip and un-equip items.  This hurts combat, as it is slower to ready and stow your weapon, and doubly so if you want to use a shield.  It's not a great solution when Minecraft figured a better one several years ago.

So what about building?  Well, there was some improvement in actually getting pieces to snap together.  This means it is much more reliable to make a structure that looks like an actual structure, and not some impossible hodgepodge of parts.  It's not perfect, since I had several instances of not being able to put a piece where I wanted, even when nothing was in the way.  But again, it's still an improvement over what I originally experienced.

Much like combat and building, the UI has improved, but is still more cumbersome than it needs to be.  Moving items to from your inventory to your equipment wheel, to leveling up, all feel like a chore.  Text is either the right size, or way too small to read on a TV.  Stats do have descriptions, and it's easier to see what you will get by spending your skill points.  The game also displays the prerequisite skills needed for higher level ones.  It's just a picture, so you have to manually try to match it up.

It seems as though the developers listened to people like me, and added some basic tutorials.  They are enough to get you started on the right foot, so the game isn't so obtuse.  There's also a neat checklist of things to do in the game.  I like that.  If you want to play but aren't sure what to do, just check the list, and try to do something from that.  Thankfully, there is also a map.  It is glorious.  Certain locations get automatically marked on it, too.

Even so, the game isn't overly fun at first.  You can still only have one save file, which is absurd.  It takes awhile to gather enough resources to build, and food/water to survive.  But tucked away in the pause menu, there is a magic option that makes the game a lot of fun.  You can turn on admin controls.  This allows you to teleport, turn off hunger/thirst, give yourself items, or even be invincible.  It is so much fun to build things when you don't run out of items part way through.  Well, you can still run out, but it's easy to spawn more.  Want some high level torches so you can see?  Poof.  What a strong sword for those pesky monsters?  Poof.  Want 100 walls so you can build a nice big house?  Poof.  The admin controls make it happen.

It might sound silly to some, but it was a game changer for me.  No longer worrying about the mundane stuff like eating, or how cumbersome things are, is a great way to increase my enjoyment.  Being able to check out high level stuff, or build interesting buildings is great.  I could travel all over the map, seeing what is out there.  The hassle-free exploration was enough to satisfy me...the rest is just a bonus.  If you are an achievement hunter, you can even use the admin controls to make all but one a simple affair.  Pretty nice.

Conan Exiles is surely improved from the game preview version available last year.  While still clunky, combat, building, and the UI have improved.  It's still not the most fun experience you can have in a survival game, but the admin controls definitely save the game, giving it a lot of entertainment value.


The Good:
The admin controls are amazing.

The Bad:
UI, combat, and building still feel cumbersome.

The SaHD:
You can build the torture wheel thing from the beginning of the first Conan movie.  I don't even think it does anything.  You can also capture enemies and force them to work in it.  Crazy!

(Review code for Conan Exiles was provided by the publisher)

Vampyr (Xbox One) Review

Vampyr is a unique RPG set in London just after World War I.  You take the role of Dr. Jonathan Reid.  Besides having a great name, he has also recently become a vampire.  He seeks to use his newfound powers to track down the one responsible, and end them.  While the fights are very action-oriented, I wouldn't call Vampyr an action RPG.

Coming across enemies, which you will do, requires combat.  Jonathan can equip two main weapons and two sub weapons.  The d-pad allows you to swap between the two when you need to.  The main weapons are things like swords and clubs.  Sub-weapons might not always deal damage, like the stake or the Liston knife that draws blood, but they are still useful.  Guns are very powerful sub-weapons that have limited ammo capacity.  Used strategically, they can turn the tide of a fight very quickly.  Enemies will of course try to hit you too, so there is a dodge maneuver.  It seems okay, but isn't the best.  For example, it can't get you out of a corner if an enemy traps you there.  It's also not a reactionary dodge, so you have to do it before an attack, but not too much before, otherwise you will still get hit.  Both attacking and dodging take stamina, so you need to do better than just mashing buttons to get through.

What I'd really like in the game is a proper stealth attack.  Something that does a lot of damage, and rewards you for being sneaky.  The vampire bite would be ideal for this, but unfortunately, it is only used to give you a small amount of blood.  If you do sneak up on an enemy, you can "stun" them, which equates to you shoving them to the ground.  You can then bite them for a measly amount of blood and damage, or hit them, which instantly breaks the stun.  Some kind of powerful attack would have been the best, I think.

There are several different weapons to find, including two handed weapons (if you equip one, you won't get an off-hand weapon for that set).  Hopefully you like crafting, since they can be made stronger.  True to many Focus-published RPGs, you can increase the stats of a weapon by using parts and leveling it up, or adding mods.  While some part amounts seem a bit high, the whole system is much more streamlined than other, similarly styled game.  I also found enough parts that I could take advantage of the system, instead of hoping for a stronger weapon to be found.  While there don't seem to be many different weapon mods, the ones present are solid.  More damage, less stamina consumed for attacking, and drawing blood.  This last one is easily my favorite.  I had difficulty getting blood reliably, because "stun then bite" was not useful after the first 30 minutes.  Moding a weapon to give some blood per hit ensured I could build up enough to use abilities and heal myself.  I definitely recommend getting one rank of this on your main weapon as soon as you can.

In addition to more normal weapons (well, as normal as swinging a broadsword around in post-WWI London can be), there are some special vampire abilities to learn.  Most take blood, which you can get from certain items, or by drinking some from enemies.  There is a blood spear, which gives you a ranged attack, or the claw, allowing you a quick and powerful melee attack.  I really liked the blood shield, which allowed me to take an extra hit.  It was very useful when dealing with multiple enemies, or ranged foes.  However, the heal is probably the most useful ability.  It does cost blood, but really helps in a tight spot.  Once you are level 10, you can also purchase an ultimate skill.  These are powerful,but have a long cooldown.  All abilities are set to the shoulder/bumper buttons, and can be re-assigned if you get more than four.  They felt a bit expensive to me, since blood can be tricky to get in fights, especially early in the game.

When not in combat, Jonathan will make his way around town, talking to others, doing side quests, finding items, crafting, and maybe even curing some sick people.  He is a doctor after all.  If you want to get powerful quickly, you can also drain people of their blood for some fast experience.  Of course, you won't be left with quest givers or shops at that rate.  To make it easier to stay your fangs, people have a blood quality.  You could eat them right away, but if you learn more about them, you will get more experience from draining their blood.  It's a nice system to balance a mad quest for power with actually talking to people.  When you talk to people about these hints and secrets you learn, Jonathan uses his mesmeric vampire powers to get them to talk.  It's a neat little detail that I like.  In fact, I really like talking to the various people and finding out all of the hints I can.

Gaining experience doesn't directly give you levels.  Instead, when you sleep, you spend your experience to buy new passive and active skills, or upgrade the ones you have.  In turn, this raises your level.  I'm not sure what amount of spent experience equates to a level increase, but it doesn't seem that important.  Your skills and weapons seem a better determination of how an encounter will go, rather than a level vs level comparison.  Your experience can also be reassigned, so don't worry too much about picking something that isn't that good.  Also note that experience costs climb quickly, so it would be very hard to max out a useful skill instead of spreading it around to several useful ones.

Vampyr's difficulty is a bit of a rocky area for the game.  You can easily take a lot of damage, and it's not hard to get hit (detection feels a bit off).  However, I could still make it through most fights without much trouble, which I like.  What I don't really like is how enemy levels seem to jump up, instead of a more natural progression.  In the first area, I received several side quests.  However, there was no way to complete a few of them, because the enemy levels were double mine or more.  Even one I could complete had level 6 enemies on one floor, and the next had level 9.  This lopsided balance even extends to the end, as a friend of mine had to fight a level 50 boss, while he was topped at 35 or so.  It's not the best design, I'd say.  And no, embracing people for experience wouldn't have helped, since doing that to...everyone...is what got him into that mess in the first place.

My last, and biggest problem with the game is the saving.  I am fully aware that one of the game's core ideas is you living (or un-living) with the consequences of your actions.  That's fair.  However, they should remember that it's a video game, so fun should be a priority.  Instead, the developers went down the Fable road, of each game having only one save slot, and it's an auto save.  Let me save in slots, so I can have a little fun.  That's one of the reasons Bethesda games do so well.  This problem is exacerbated by the Mass Effect-like dialogue options.  Remember the joke that you pick an innocent-sounding option, only to have it go awry?  While not as overblown as the jokes, that sort of thing is sadly present.

There are several minor ones, but the first major one is what stuck with me the most.  I don't want to spoil parts of the story, so I'll be vague.  I caught someone doing something bad, and had the following options: killing them, making them quit their job, or making them forget.  I thought that having them forget the bad thing they were doing was a great idea.  It was also in the blue text, which previously meant it was derived from a hint.  So, I picked that option.  Instead of doing what it sounded like, it made them forget everything.  Not enough that they could continue being useful and not do the thing I wanted them to stop, but all of what they knew.  So, they just wandered off, ruining two communities.  What?!  That's a really severe consequence to a choice that doesn't have near enough information.  Why are there two bad options instead of the one obvious one?  Too bad I can't just load and get the result I wanted and was trying for, all because of some David Cage-like god complex.  Forcing consequences may be alright at times, but not when it feels like you are being tricked into it.  It really made me want to stop, but I persevered and kept playing.

Vampyr has its faults, but I'd still say it's a fun RPG.  I was expecting something more along the lines of Focus' other RPG offerings, but this is much more substantial than a downloadable game.  It offers 40 or so hours of quests, dialogue choices, and adrenaline-filled combat.  It's a solid title, and one I would heartily recommend to RPG fans, or people looking for an interesting vampire game to play.


The Good:
Lots of choices for who to feed on and who to save in this fairly solid RPG offering.  Good replay value.

The Bad:
Hitting and dodging can be spotty at times, enemy levels seem to jump up instead of rising normally.  One auto-save file and questionable dialogue choices don't make for a good combination.

The SaHD:
It's pronounced "vampire", although I keep wanting to say "vam-peer".  I'll deal, since the "Y" motif is meant to evoke the autopsy incision.

(Review code for Vampyr was received from the publisher)

Aces of the Luftwaffe - Squadron (Xbox One) Review

Aces of the Luftwaffe - Squadron is a vertical plane shooting game, popularly referred to as a shmup (shoot-em-up).  I'm always happy to try out a new one.  It is set during around World War II, where you are eventually tasked with taking down some of the 3rd Reich's air forces.  It also has up to 4 player co-op, in case you wondered why it has the "Squadron" subtitle.

The game is broken down into 5 chapters, each with 5 stages in them.  The fifth stage is a boss fight.  As you complete each stage and chapter, the next opens up.  There's a story as well, as every stage has some dialogue to set up the mission, and banter between the squadron mates.  While the voice work isn't great by any stretch of the imagination, the story is okay.  It does make a strange turn toward the end, though.

In addition, each stage has a specific extra mission that, if completed, awards extra medals that can be used to level up your squadron.  Several of theses extra missions are staying in one place for a few seconds to drop or pick something up, or destroying a certain number of a specific enemy.  Boss fights have the all important "survive" extra missions, where you have to...well, not die.  Yeah, that one isn't that inspired, I agree.  The most unique one is when you have to remain undetected.  Enemy aircraft will have searchlights, and you have to maneuver your squad around them with out triggering the alarm.  Thankfully you can't shoot until you are detected.  It's a neat idea, and one that I felt was pulled off pretty well.

Adding even more unique mechanics to the game, there are several points in the story when one of your pilots will be afflicted with the disorder that they suffer from.  When Mark is feeling the affects of the poison in his body, you have to move very slowly until it subsides.  When John is angry, you either steer clear, or get wrecked.  Steve will fall asleep in the middle of the battle...somehow.  Strangely, defending him wakes him up faster, where I would think him getting shot would wake him up right quick.  Melissa just has a fear of heights.  Great thing for a pilot.  In another strange twist, hers is the easiest disorder to deal with.  She just leaves.  No special condition, no real inconvenience.  Her firepower is missing, but that's no different from when she gets shot down.  These happen at set points in the story, so at least you can plan around them.  I like the idea the developers had for these, as it makes the pilots more unique, but it can be a pain to deal with.

I definitely would not have expected this in this type of game, but there are full-blown skill trees.  Each character has several skills they can learn, both passive and active.  When you level up, or find a hidden skill coin, these are saved to your profile and later used to buy skills.  There are skills to make the pilots do more damage, increase dodge chance (very useful for the AI), and even ones that have a chance to active.  These are my favorite, solely because of Steve's skill that can slow down time.  This helped me out of more than one jam.  All learned active skills are available, and you cycle to the one you want.  They share the same cooldown though, so you don't get several at the same time.  While I haven't done it yet, the skill coins can be refunded and spent anew.  It costs some medals to do so.

While the game has some new and interesting things, there are also some problems.  You can get new ships to fly, but they are random drops from bosses, complete with rarities.  This isn't too bad, since the skills on the ships I have are not very good.  I'm not a fan of random drops like that, though.  Speaking of which, gun upgrades are also random.  You have to collect a crate to upgrade, and those are usually random upon enemy defeat.  Considering you are pathetically weak without the upgrades later in the game, this is not good.  The power ups also have ammo, so they can run out.  Conserving ammo is not really a thing to force in a shoot-em-up game...it's kind of the point to shoot everything.

But of course everything will shoot you.  It's not bad on the easier levels, but toward the end and on higher difficulties, bullet spreads and enemy attack intervals ensures there are times you just can't do anything except get hit.  That chance increases when the screen shakes from your supposed helpful skills, or when the UI/dialogue/explosions cover up valuable screen space.  Plane movement is sometimes wonky, moving you faster than normal.  Maybe it's the "wind resistance" that one plane partially protects against?  I don't know, they don't really tell you that.  Speaking of movement, you can't go all the way to the bottom of the screen.  It actually hurts your dodging ability, since so may big things (like bosses) take up too much of the screen.  That last inch would make a world of difference.  Add in spotty hit detection, and it's a recipe for going down.  Plus, there is no way to dodge everything and not have the wing-men get hit.  They will die plenty of times, and there isn't much you can do about it.

Oh, and that third boss.  You have to go into her shield to damage her?  How on earth would we figure that out?  The shield blocks shots, and you take a ton of collision damage, so why would you fly into the shield, unless you died several times and gave up trying to figure out what to do?

I feel like these would be less of a problem if a few things were different.  For one, the bomb ability should get rid of bullets.  That's baseline for a shmup.  Second, you need a reliable spread shot.  Pretty much every shot is focused toward the front exclusively, with very little capable of hitting outside of that.  When the only plausible or safe way to hit an enemy is from an angle, this is killer.  Very high level power-ups will give some kind of area attacks, but they tend to be very weak.  So even if you could get them, they aren't much help.

Overall, Aces of Luftwaffe - Squadron had some fun.  There are a some problems I had with the game, but it was enjoyable outside of the problem missions.  I would encourage shmup fans to give it a try.


The Good:
Unique pilots, ships, and skills.  Skill trees!

The Bad:
Hard to maneuver around shots while not getting something hit.  Shots are front focused, which is not the best thing to force in a shmup.

The SaHD:
It took me awhile to realize it, but they only refer to the enemy as "Germans" and "Krauts", not "Nazis".  And wait, that isn't the right symbol on that UFO...

(Review code for Aces of the Luftwaffe - Squadron was received from the publisher)

Titan Quest (Xbox One) Review

Nostalgia can be a powerful force, even in small doses.  Years ago, I finally got around to playing a Diablo-style game on the PC called Titan Quest.  I didn't end up playing very long (part because I don't play games on the PC very much, and part because I wanted to do multiplayer with my wife), but I enjoyed the game and wanted to go back to it.  Once the game came to Xbox One and PS4, I was excited to give it a try.

Right off the bat, I was thrown into the character creator.  My excitement quickly dropped when I realized just how limited it is.  You can set gender and tunic color.  Even if most things would be covered by armor, I was hoping for a bit more.  Also, the game disappointingly only has single player and online multiplayer.  I know this won't effect everybody, but no couch co-op is a negative point for me.

Once in the actual game, my excitement started to make a comeback.   You can hold the X button down to auto attack, but it only works when there are enemies around.  That makes logical sense, but sometimes you want to try out a weapon's speed, or a new skill in safety.  Aiming attacks feels strange.  Instead of facing the direction you want to attack, your character will instead lock on to one in range.  To change targets, you hold down the attack button and point the left stick towards the new enemy.  There are plenty of times I tried to change my direction to change where I would attack, only to have it not work.  It's just cumbersome and not intuitive.

From there, the controls don't get any better.  The A Button picks up items and interacts with npcs/items/etc.  While it normally works fine, you can interact with your summoned creature.  It doesn't seem to do anything, but when you inevitably do it while trying to pick up loot, you will just stand there for a second, unable to do anything.  It's...just not good.  Oh, and the A Button will not pick up loot that has fallen through the map.  Sadly, it happened to me over a dozen times.  My son watched me play the game for an hour, and saw it at least three separate times.  That's also not good.

It bugs me that official screenshots usually lack the HUD

Health and magic potions are well labeled, though.  They are set on the bumpers, and are quick and easy to use when you need them.  Skills you learn will be set to the d-pad.  Yes, you read that right.  That's okay for buffs and other similar things, but just awful for attack skills.  But at least you get eight slots.  You can set a skill for the Y Button, but it doesn't feel responsive.  Maybe it's the few skills I tried there, but I had a lot of trouble getting them to activate, even when the target was in range.

The B Button will swap between your two weapon sets.  While this does allow you to set something else on the Y Button for the second set, it's not a function I would use with any regularity.  How often are you switching weapon sets?  Certainly not enough that you would want a face button dedicated to it.  It seems like that should be relegated to the d-pad instead of skills.  Even if they didn't want to copy something like Diablo 3, they could at least take the skill setting idea from the X-Men Legends games.  They did it right, and before Titan Quest originally launched.  Instead, they tried to invent a wheel, but ended up with a rectangle.

Okay, so that doesn't sound so great, but there is something good in the game.  There are nine different skill trees, many of which look fun to me.  Every level gives you three skill points, which can be used to buy or power-up skills, or increase the rank (and stats) of the class itself.  The higher the rank, the more skills you can learn.  It took me a minute to figure out how it worked, but I actually really like the skill trees.  I at first settled on an earth mage, and it was pretty fun.  A few of the skill made me think it would work really well with a melee fighter, but it was a mage set.  However, at level eight, you can choose a second class.  It's entirely optional, which is pretty cool too.  You don't gain any extra skill points, so there is a drawback to doing so.  However, there are several skills that work fine for a class, but much better when paired with another.  It's a great class and skill system that I am eager to play around with.

As for the game's story and quests, they are fairly limited and linear.  There are less quests than I expected.  Also, they are basic "go here and kill these things" types.  Turns out, that's fine by me, as the system for tracking quests and showing information on them is very, very basic.  Actually, it's probably less than basic.  It basically says what you have to do, but not exactly were to go, or have any kind of counters.  Side quest destinations are not far from where you get them, so it's not an issue.  The maps look really nice, but there is no variance in them.  The predictability makes it easier to complete quests, but having some variance in them other than chest contents would be very nice when going through with other characters.  I want to try out multiple classes, but it's a bit of a downer that all the areas will be the same.

Many years ago, Titan Quest was a great game. Since that time, the genre has evolved. Playing the game on a current console really drives home how archaic it is. It might not be fair to compare it to Diablo 3, but that game showed us how great this style of game can be (and play) on a console. Titan Quest, while somewhat fun, just can't compare to that, or other similar games on the same consoles. Instead of just a face lift, this 11+ year old game really needed a full-on remaster to bring it up to current genre standards.


The Good:
Multiple job class combinations to play around with.

The Bad:
Feels dated, controls are awkward.

The SaHD:
I'm really hoping it gets a couch co-op patch, but I may have to settle for getting a second Xbox One to play some co-op with the missus.

(Review code for Titan Quest was received from the publisher)

ReCore ReVisit ReView (Xbox One)

What a difference an update makes.  In very late 2016, I reviewed ReCore, and found it fun but ultimately unfinished and unpolished.  The game has finally had its big update, which adds the missing content and then some.  It also gains a Definitive Edition to its title.

New to this update is  an entire zone (Starving Sea), the infamous tank core frame, three shot types, some dungeons, and changes to the Shifting Sands area.  The new area has some of the new dungeons, and you will need the new frame to race around the area for the keys.  It's also perpetually dark, which they explain in the glossary.  That doesn't make it easier to see, though.  The level cap has increased to level 40, and the enemies in the new area and its dungeons skew toward the higher end of that.  It's a real pain to get through since I had previously completed the game and extra stuff when the level cap was 30.  I did gain two levels when I loaded my save, but it wasn't enough.  To top it off, I encountered some bugs while trying out this new content.

The new tank (T8-NK) frame is a mixed bag.  Its mobility and utility use are good, but otherwise it's unremarkable.  It didn't feel that useful in combat.  The little face is cute, though.  Joule's new shots are notably less of a mixed bag.  In fact, I didn't like them.  They just aren't fun to use, nor more useful than the normal charge shot.  Outside of the few times you are required to use them, I had no need to, nor did I want to.  It's also not good to just cram them all together in such a small span, since you do a vast majority of the game without them.  I'd just as easily not use them at all, as they feel superfluous.

Shifting Sands now lives up to its name, as storms can appear and change the zone.  After a storm, new areas appear, leaving previous ones inaccessible for a time.  It's a cool idea, but is unfortunately bogged down by a bad timer.  It's not very long, which is good when you want to go to a certain dungeon, but bad when you just want to explore the newly opened areas and grab some collectibles.  If I was starting the game over from the beginning, this change would have been more apparent.  Until I finished the new stuff, I had no idea that the storms are what let you access the other new dungeons.  They are level-appropriate for the area, so I should have done them before the other new content.  The new traversal dungeons can be pretty frustrating, and sadly the timer glitch has been fixed.  I knew it would be, but it is still sad to see it go.

One last change was reducing the number of prismatic cores needed to get through the final area.  Now it only takes 30, where that only got you into the lowest level before.  This change doesn't affect me, since I already had 80 of them, but it is nice for newer players.  They also seem to give out more of them.  The new dungeons have more orbs as the easier prizes, and some new ones are just lying around in the openings of old ones.  I'm not sure why they bothered to add more, and make them so easy to get, since you barely need them anymore.  Just doing content you came across in the original got me over 30, the rest just feel useless.

While the price was right for the "definitive" upgrade, most of the rest doesn't seem worth it.  The game feels more finished, content-wise, but that's about it.  A few additions were nice, but most just didn't feel balanced or needed, and the game still needs polish.  I feel it all could have been done better.  Overall, the Definitive Edition soured me on the game.  If you really want to play all that ReCore has to offer, or get a few (as of now) rare achievements, then by all means dive back in.  If not, there's really nothing added that would make me recommend coming back.


The Good:
Well, the update is free, and finishes the game.

The Bad:
Sadly, the update doesn't add any polish.  The game somehow now needs even more than it previously did.

The SaHD:
One of the new story dungeons froze on me.  When attempting it again, I beat the boss but died immediately afterwards because of his annoying minion.  The minion would then not stop spawning so I could actually finish the dungeon and get my prizes.  However, I got story completion for the dungeon, and was able to move on.  It also didn't pop the achievement, so in theory I completed the story after this mandatory dungeon without completing it.  Sigh.

(ReCore was previously purchased by reviewer)

Agents of Mayhem (Xbox One) Review

As a fan of Saints Row IV and Gat Out of Hell, I was eager to try out Agents of Mayhem, since it's essentially a spin off game based off one of the Gat endings.  I was fully sold on playing it once I saw the achievement art.  Eighties greatness!

Like Saints Row, this game is a third person shooter.  Instead of one agent, your team consists of three that you can switch between as the need arises.  Each agent has a different weapon and special moves.  There are machine guns, chain guns, shotguns...you get the picture.  All of the agents were unique and stood out as characters.  The specials were sometimes like grenades, sometimes debuffs, or even an alt-fire for their weapon.  To round out their abilities, agents also can use a mayhem move when the meter is filled (this meter isn't shared among them, either).  Most of these were a joy to use.  I'll admit Hollywood, while not my favorite agent, has a great mayhem move.  Just like a Michael Bay-esque action hero, he gets dramatic music and lots of explosions.  It's useful and appropriate.

Movement is...okay at best.  Sure, it has some nice stuff, like a triple jump and a dash/air dash (for some agents).  The dash has a cooldown that isn't shown, but I eventually got the timing down.  The triple jump is serviceable, although it doesn't really seem to cover enough ground considering how high some of the buildings are.  There are lifts and other things to help you get to the top, but being able to scale buildings was something done much better in an older, similar style game.  If the agent doesn't have an air dash, they can usually grab a wall and pull themselves up a bit higher.  While it has its uses, I feel the air dash is better and more useful.

Aiming is also an aspect I had some issues with.  The longer you hold the stick in a direction, the faster it will move.  That's...great for some people, but it almost always messed me up.  I constantly overshot targets while trying to aim at them.  I really wish there was an option to change or reduce this.  There is a sensitivity option, but it doesn't seem to affect that.  After a few hours, I got used to it.  The aiming is also pretty generous, so you don't have to be dead on to get a hit.  You do still have to be pretty accurate for a critical hit, though.

As you kill enemies and complete missions, you will gain experience and level up.  Each level grants a point that can increase one of your passive skills.  Being a team player (and having read some sage advice), I put all my points into the squad skills first, since they would benefit all members of my team.  Each agent also has three core abilities that you must use an upgrade core to buy.  These can either be obtained from mission rewards, or by collecting 10 core fragments around the world.

Oh, and there's still more.  There are three modifiers agents can equip to customize their skills and weapon.  You also purchase base upgrades that effect the whole team as the agency levels up.  Gremlin tech is basically consumables that are special attacks, buffs, or debuffs.  Finally, there is Legion tech, which are extra modifiers that you equip to your modifiers.  It might sound complicated, but it makes sense once you start playing the game.

The game flows like most typical third person open world games.  Go to a place, do the thing, get rewards.  There's some collectibles around the map, but they are basically the core fragments.  I like that you need to do two part missions to unlock new agents.  The second part is basically using them, so you learn what they are capable of.  Since you should switch your teams around a lot, this is useful knowledge.  Story missions are made up of multiple parts, and not many opportunities for a break.  While there is also a mission replay feature, you have to beat the game to get it.

For the open-world aspect, there are many other things to do around the map.  They are all pretty much random, which is good and bad.  Good because you can always have more to do, but bad because they tend to be generic, and you can never be "done" with them all.  That ties into the random contracts that you can do.  Legion also has secret bases that have hidden entrances that can appear out of the environment.  It's something that I would have thought about as a kid, and it's cool to see it here.  It feels legit.  Unfortunately, these bases start to feel very generic because they are randomly assembled from a few different room types.  Completing a base, or taking back and outpost can spawn one of Legion's doomsday weapons.  Doing these wasn't fun for me.  I kept doing them because I wanted to at least try them all.  Getting a golem to spawn took me 22 attempts...which is sad because there are only 3 possibilities!

I liked Agents of Mayhem, but the aiming and movement could use a little work.  It reminded me a lot of Crackdown, a game I love, but wasn't as good as that sadly.  The world is built like Crackdown, but is definitely covered with a Saints Row IV skin...just look at all those purple lights!  I liked my rental enough to eventually purchase and complete the game.


The Good:
Lots of things to do, and characters to do it with.  Some funny jokes and the achievement pictures are awesome!

The Bad:
The movement and aiming could use little work.  Enemy lairs feel very generic.

The SaHD:
At various points, the game was definitely getting harder.  Then I noticed the game kept upping my difficulty setting as I played.  Don't do that!

(Agents of Mayhem was rented and later purchased from Redbox)

LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens (Xbox One) Review

LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens was not an entirely unexpected release (they have done the other movies before), but one that's different from the normal release.  Instead of following multiple movies, it follows one.  Because there isn't quite enough content from just that one film, there are added levels to help flesh out characters or plot points.  At least it follows the story better than the Disney Infinity set for the same movie.

Like the other Traveler's Tales LEGO games, this is a third person action adventure game.  You go through each level, fight some bad guys, solve some light puzzles, and get to the end.  The levels in The Force Awakens are pretty good at following the movies.  They also intersperse the vehicle sections into the normal levels.  The LEGO games I played usually had those as their own separate level.  There are lots of collectibles in each level, and goals to complete to unlock things.  You can't do everything the first time through the level.  Once you unlock more abilities, you can revisit the levels and get the things you couldn't before.  While this is par for the course, you now have to finish the story mode before you can do free play for a level.  While it's a good idea to do that anyway, it seems like an odd restriction.

I haven't really played many LEGO games since the first LEGO Batman, so some of these changes might not be new.  Different characters have different abilities, although now most of those have an associated mini-game to them.  Grapple pulls require mashing, which makes sense to me.  Strength requires...a timing one?  You'd think mashing would make more sense there.  Protocol droids have to match a series of symbols.  Astromech droids have to match wheels.  This one actually makes some sense, as it reminds me of Artoo's spinning robot plug.  Still, on the whole they feel unnecessary.  I don't really like to do them, nor do I want to.

Speaking of unnecessary and not fun, they also added cover-based shooting sections.  These mimic third-person cover-based shooters fairly well.  You stay in cover by default, and have to hold the left trigger to peek out so you can shoot.  They at least warn you when an enemy is targeting you, but it's still a pain to aim and shoot most troops.  Sometimes it auto-aims, which helps, but other times it won't, despite someone really close to where the cursor starts.  I get what they are going for, but it just doesn't work.  Considering the developers don't bother to fix problems with the game, I doubt these will ever get better.

Following only one movie instead of three also comes with another pit fall: length.  There's much less story to go through, making the game rather short (to be a stormtrooper).  My wife and I were able to get through the entire story in less than 10 hours.  There are the extra unlockable levels and other activities to do if you are so inclined.  Also, lots of collectibles to find and characters to buy.  Sure, a vast majority are in no way necessary, but I guess it adds to the playtime.  This release also features the biggest variety of non-characters that nobody really wants to play as, just to give more "content".

Like the other LEGO games, it isn't too hard to go through the levels.  If you die, you will just lose some studs (currency) and respawn.  The only real challenge is trying to figure out what they want you to do at times, from having to do a new mini-game, to figuring out what you have to do to move forward, to fighting with the flight controls.  Most times it didn't keep the inverted control settings for either player.

If you have enjoyed all the other Traveler's Tales' LEGO games, you should enjoy The Force Awakens.  My wife and I had enough fun to finish the story.  Still, it didn't change my opinions on these games.  Instead of fixing the problems, they just add things, most of which are unnecessary.  I don't want a mini-game for every ability, and I certainly don't want those shooting sections.  The extra levels of things not seen in the movie are a decent though, but also feel unimportant.  The fact that the game only covers one movie is another thing that hurts this release.  If you want to play it, I would recommend renting it, as you can easily beat it in that time.


The Good:
Some of the silly stuff is actually pretty funny.

The Bad:
Character ability mini-games and the shoot out sections are not necessary nor fun.

The SaHD:
Let's hope the inevitable LEGO The Last Jedi incorporates some of Rogue One to pad out its length.

(LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens was rented from Redbox)

ELEX (Xbox One) Review

Did you play Risen or either of its sequels?  Did you enjoy them?  If yes, then you will likely enjoy ELEX.

Oh, you'd like some more info?  Fair enough, as I have more to say, but be warned that there are many comparisons between the two.  The team responsible for the Risen games has fully entered the current generation of games with their new offering, ELEX.  Instead of being a fantasy world, this one is set in a post apocalyptic fantasy world.  That probably comes across as sarcastic, but I admit I really like the idea of the game and the world it builds.

ELEX's world is pretty big, too.  There are several different environments, which all make sense in the context of the game.  There are plenty of places to visit, items to loot, and enemies to fight.  Several factions all fight for dominance, and you can join them, or work against them.  There are lots of quests to complete, too.  For better or worse, these will send you all over the map.  While this is to be expected of later quests, there are too many of these early on.  When you are just starting out, and hit the first town, you'd like quests that are close by, with weaker enemies, so you can build up your level and inventory.  Too bad the developers don't agree with that player-friendly philosophy.

Some early quests can be completed in the town, but most involve running to other places.  I'd be fine with that but again, theses are past enemies that you have no business fighting.  You will just die really quickly.  You can get eventually get a partner to run around with you that makes fighting a little easier.  However, you still have to go past monsters much too strong for you before you can complete the companion quests.  The only real solution is to run away from enemies and try to avoid them.  Showing a suggested level for quests might be a good start, but I'd really just prefer the enemies around the town were beatable at reasonable levels.  It shouldn't be too much to ask to have a balanced game.

Now we get to the combat.  Like Risen, it is pretty stiff.  Enemies can do a lot of damage to you very quickly.  You have an attack, block, roll, and jump.  Attacks are fairly self-explanatory, and do well enough on their own.  If you connect with enough hits together, you will build up a meter that allows you to execute a special move.  This would be good, except for the bad aspect of combat: stamina.

Attacking takes stamina.  Dodge rolling takes stamina.  Blocking stifles your stamina regeneration.  Attacking enough times to fill the special rarely leaves you with enough stamina to then actually use the move.  Dodging and enemy's attack tends to leave you too far or without enough stamina to counter.  Blocking doesn't seem to reduce the damage much (maybe a shield would help, but I can't really afford that and skill training).  Worst of all, stamina isn't tied to a stat, so the only way to increase it is by training in a particular skill, which will take hours to be able to get.  I'm not a fan of these kind of limiting factors in fighting, as the fun level just crashes.

With no HUD, you know it's a glamshot.

On the other hand, ranged combat felt pretty good.  The damage seems good, and it gives you an early advantage in encounters.  The only drawback is having to find or buy a lot of ammo.  Needless to say, money isn't always that easy to come by, especially in the early game.  It gets better as you go (especially with some key skills), but doesn't help the first 10 or so hours, where the difficulty is killer.  Switching from melee to ranged worked okay at best, but I think that's because my controller's d-pad isn't what it used to be.

Probably the best aspect of the game is the jet pack.  This allows you to explore, take shortcuts, or sometimes avoid enemies.  It takes a bit to get used to how it works, but after a few minutes of practice I was long jumping like a pro.  The added vertical dimension to exploration really opens the world up.  The companions seem to have them too, so you won't leave them in the dust when you use it.  If it wasn't for the jet pack, I'm not sure I could have survived the first few hours of the game, since it is so dangerous.

When you level up, you gain 10 stat points and a skill point.  The stat points you can allocate yourself, while you must pay a trainer to use the skill point.  The skill trees are all clearly laid out, as is the requirements for that level of skill.  Trainers are marked on your map as well.  Except for the rising costs of training, I think the skill and stat system works pretty well.  I'm betting you can still mess up your character though.

At many points through your adventure, you will have to make choices.  These can affect your "coldness", which is how human you act.  Many of your responses affect this, even ones you wouldn't think.  If the coldness matters, I'd really like to know which responses affect it, since most feel random.  Depending on your answers in quests, there are different outcomes.  Standard, yes, but appreciated.  Of course there are also romance options in the game.  The dialogue in the game is pretty good, save for my problem with the coldness rating.

I remember the difficulty curve in Risen, so I put ELEX on easy at the start.  It was still very rough, and I shudder to think how bad things can get on the hardest setting.  You take a lot of damage from enemy hits, and can very quickly get out of your league when just moving around the map.  Since enemies don't display levels, your only indication of difficulty is the skull icon next to an enemy's health.  That means they are too strong for you.  If it's not there, they still might be.  Point is, the game is way too hard and unforgiving on even the easiest setting, since there is no effective balance.  That really kills my enjoyment.

ELEX has some very unique things about it, but is also massively bogged down by abysmal game balance.  It's very similar to the Risen series, just with balance that is somehow even worse.  I really wanted to like the game far more than I did.


The Good:
The setting, world, and story are pretty good.

The Bad:
Lack of quest and enemy levels, and did I mention the balance?  I think I did, but they game just doesn't want you to have fun playing it.

The SaHD:
The money is called Elex shards, Elex, and shards.  It's pretty confusing for the first few hours.

(Review code for Elex was provided by the publisher, THQ Nordic)

Morphite (Xbox One) Review

When I first heard about Morphite, it sounded like No Man's Sky, but with a story.  It's a space exploration adventure game.  You guide Myrah and travel from planet to planet to find out the secrets of the legendary Morphite.  Plus, there are tons of extra planets that are randomly generated when you land on them.

When you first see the game, it can be a jarring experience.  I immediately thought it looked like a child colored an N64 game.  I'm not meaning that in a negative way, that was just the impression I got.  The worlds are very colorful, and not big on detail.  What they are big on is visible polygons.

The story isn't really ground breaking, but it's enough of an excuse to hop from planet to planet and battle bosses.  The story worlds are not randomly generated, and have some light puzzle solving.  My main complaint with the story is that it's trying too hard to be funny.  However, they do succeed with your robotic companion Kitcat, who I find very humorous.  Maybe I just have a weakness for sarcastic robots.

Exploration involves a lot of moving around, jumping, scanning creatures, and later on, some grappling.  There are a lot of things to scan, from plant life to creatures and even some minerals.  There are even variations of each one: strong, weak, and even rare.  Trouble is, there was little to no visual difference between them.  So, you end up running around, trying to scan anything and everything to see if it's a new one.  Little and quick creatures are also annoying to scan.  It's not the quickest scanning, and the lock-on is really bad for it.  Scanning kind of a pain, but you do need the money and rare scans.

Story locations are marked on the star maps, but on the actual planets very little is.  Objective markers would have been nice for the times in the second half of the story where I was lost and confused.  The maps in general just aren't good.  Sure, they show the outline of the land, but no detail.  Oh, and they are limited to your current elevation, meaning they change a lot when going up or down.  Ugh.

Besides scanning and jumping, you will also be shooting.  After all, not everything in the universe is friendly.  Fighting on foot is very basic.  You aim with one stick, move with the other, and shoot with the trigger.  The Left Trigger locks on.  It works slightly better than it does for scanning, so it's best not to rely on it.  Ammo can be pretty scarce.  Thankfully, the basic pistol will slowly refill to 5 shots if it runs out.  It's not a huge help when your max is 100 shots, but at least you won't be left defenseless.  Switching between the different weapons and the scanner isn't very quick, either.  While I didn't die that often (at least from health loss), you can die pretty quickly if you aren't careful.  The boss fights aren't very hard, either.

Moving in space is little more than picking a destination from a star map.  You can only go so far as you have fuel.  Fuel will regenerate over time, so it's best to hang out in a space station and do some trading, or explore a planet and do some scanning.  There are some random events while traveling too, like finding items, losing money, finding traders, and getting jumped by enemies.  Like land battles, space battles are very basic.  You are in a stationary turret, and try to aim at the enemies.  Every shot produces heat, so you don't want to shoot so much that you overheat your gun and have to wait.  There's also a dodge that you can use every few seconds to try and avoid damage.  The space battles function, but they aren't terribly exciting.

What else can you do?  Well, you can sell your scans.  Rare scans and harvested minerals can be used for various upgrades to your suit and ship.  The necessary rare scans come from similar sources.  Need heat resistance?  Get a rare scan from something in a hot environment.  It makes sense, but can be a hassle trying to track down the last few you need.  Ship improvements are just pure money, and weapon upgrades require money and mineral resources.  Minerals are gained from shooting the appropriate rocks randomly on planets.  Sometimes you find a good amount, and sometimes there is only one.  The improvements get pretty substantial though, so it's worth doing them.  I'd recommend fuel first, so you can go to farther systems much faster.

As with most games, there are problems abound in Morphite.  There are holes in the environment and strange invisible walls.  I'm betting most of these are because of the random worlds.  I've fallen through the map several times, and some even on story stages.  I've gotten stuck in the environment and on various places on planets.  Some of these can be solved by quitting to the menu.  It thankfully saves very often, but the worlds are generated when you land on them, so even if going back to the same one, it will have a different map.  One story planet kept locking up while I was trying to load it up.  My last big gripe is that I can't adjust the viewing area.  This cuts off text on all sides of my screen and just bothers me constantly.

So is Morphite just No Man's Sky with a story?  Not as much as I would have thought in the beginning.  It has a distinct visual style, and an unremarkable plot saved by a back-talkin' bot.  The randomly generated worlds can be nice, but feel too much like each other to stand out.  The shooting aspects are very basic.  Scanning everything can be fun as you try to find the rare scans you need for the next upgrade, but you will end up doing it a lot.  It's not a hard game, but does have annoying parts that keep it from being a relaxing experience.  Overall, it's worth trying, but likely won't end up being memorable.


The Good:
Many worlds to explore, upgrades to purchase, and story to uncover.

The Bad:
Lacks polish or depth in many areas.

The SaHD:
How awkward was that scene where you learn about the grapple gun?  It just sounded like a video game.  It wasn't natural at all.

(Review code for Morphite was provided by the publisher)

Battle Chasers: Nightwar (Xbox One) Review

When I first started Battle Chasers: Nightwar, I only knew it was an RPG.  The visuals hooked me instantly.  The story animation and art is done really well.  In the game itself, the character designs, enemy models, and environments look spectacular.  It really looks like the 3D modeling of a comic book.

There's a reason for that.  Apparently, Battle Chasers was actually a comic book series from the late 90s to the very early 2000s.  Well, according to its Wikipedia page, the final(?) three issues are supposed to come out after the game, so I guess I shouldn't say "was" a comic book series.  Also, it seems Joe Madureira, the original creator is involved in making the game.  I guess that's why the game looks so good.

You might be wondering why I learned all of this.  The simple reason is it relates to one of my few problems with the game.  The story in the game is mostly self-contained, but the characters already knew each other.  It was obvious that I was starting in the middle of their tale, and I wondered if it was some property that I didn't know about.  It turns out that it was.

Anyway, the world map is fairly big, and you move from place to place on set paths.  Some places have alternate paths, which sometimes avoid enemies, and sometimes lead to extra places.  Fights are clearly labeled, and there are chests and gathering points on them, too.  If you want the enemies or gathering points back, you can either complete a dungeon or reload the game, which can be really useful to do.  The town shops are also accessed from this map, which took a bit of getting used to.

Once you find and enter an exploration area or dungeon, you will have more freedom of movement.  They also contain treasures, items to examine, and wandering monsters.  Each character gets abilities that you can use in these areas.  Some are just generally helpful, like the robot's heal.  Others can be used for exploration, like Gully's rock destroying punch.  Pretty much all of them can be used when making contact with an enemy to give you an edge in combat, too.  I would like it if they weren't as limited as they are, and only staying at an inn replenishes their uses.

Battles are tried and true turn-based fun.  Your speed, or in this game, haste, determines when and how often your turn comes up.  At first you get what appears to be a normal set of actions, but as you level up, there are some nice surprises.  Besides having a normal attack, there are alternates.  For example, Garrison also gets a move that does less damage than a normal attack, but applies bleed.  There are some special moves that will get an added benefit from that, on top of the fact that the target will suffer damage over time.  Calibretto, the healing robot, has a normal move that removes debuffs from a party member.  Status ailments are considered debuffs, so this is a very useful move.  Too bad I often want him to attack instead.

The other cool and unique concept is overload.  When you do a normal attack (or some other actions), you will build up overload.  When you use a skill that takes MP, you will use overload first.  So, it's basically extra MP.  Sadly, it usually doesn't stay with you after combat, but it does mean you can never actually run out of MP.  If you do, just attack and you'll have some more!  Now you know why I want my healer attacking, so I can do some healing for free.  I don't always get to take advantage of overload, but I really like it.

Battles themselves are sometimes harder than I would have thought.  Enemies hit hard, and it can be hard to keep up with the healing.  Even so, I did go a long time without needing to resurrect somebody.  If enemies are weaker, you can just mash attack on them, but as you go further in the game, and especially during the boss fights, you will want to plan out your moves.  Since battles are turn-based, you have the time to do so, and I suggest you use it.  Some fights are linked, where you will have to fight them back-to-back with no break in between.  These can wear you down, but are good for building up overload.

Each character can equip a weapon and armor (unique to each person).  In addition, there are 3 slots for a ring, necklace, and trinket (not unique to each person).  These obviously change your stats, usually for the better.  There are plenty of times that equipment gave different bonuses that the previous piece, so I had to choose which I thought was better.  I guess my biggest complaint with the equipment is that it seems to be random loot drops from chests, meaning you may get too many for characters that don't need it, and not enough for those that do.

There is a crafting system, so you can eventually make some equipment yourself.  It might be good, but it feels really inconsistent.  You can't just make the stuff you have recipes for, you also have to be at the right place.  Strewn about are different facilities that allow you to make stuff.  There's several of them in dungeons.  While that can be useful, it's just strange.  Really, I'd just like a more convenient place to do it, so I could actually play around with it and see if the crafting system is actually worth using.

Besides equipment, another way to make your characters stronger is with perks.  These act as passives, and there are various effects.  Some increase various stats, like dodge, attack power, or stamina, while others can make your active skills better.  There are also a few that just do generally useful stuff, like a small heal at the end of battle, or being able to keep a little bit of overload.  I really like those types of perks.  My favorite thing about them is that they aren't permanently assigned.  As far as I could tell, you can freely reassign the points (outside of combat) as the situation dictates.  Some are better for random encounters, and maybe you have others for a tough boss fight.  While I don't think they really mentioned the perks, except for a loading screen tip or two, it is something you should get into as early as you can.

One other personal problem I have with the game is the saving.  It's a full auto save environment.  There are multiple save slots, so you can either have multiple playthroughs, or have other people play on your profile, but each only really has that one auto save.  While it saves frequently, and I haven't had any issues with that, I would love to be able to make a hard save.  Mostly for my piece of mind, but also so I can play around with the crafting stuff to better understand it.

Besides the main quest, there are a few other things to do.  There's a fishing mini-game, because of course there is.  It's fairly simple, and therefore not bad.  You can also do some side quests, and even special hunting quests.  Add in the arena fights, and well, you have a fairly standard set of extra stuff to do in an RPG.  Even so, it's not really a knock against the game, just nothing new.

I really liked playing Battle Chasers: Nightwar.  The art is cool, the game is fun, and the battles are just difficult enough to get you to think.  I'd like some more polish in the information areas though, as there were things that I only learned about from random loading screen tips.  RPG fans, I strongly encourage you to play it.


The Good:
A solid and fun turn-based RPG with enough character and unique mechanics to not feel old.

The Bad:
A few small issues: only auto save, crafting system is a bit weird, and I actually learned stuff from the tip screens.  I'm not really sure why that last one is a negative.

The SaHD:
I think I'm going to check out the comic books at some point.  I'm interested in these characters.

(Review code for Battle Chasers: Nightwar was provided by the publisher)