Strategy Guide Reviews

A Strategy Guide for your Strategy Guides

Child of Light Mini-Review

By Leave a Comment

Now here’s an RPG I can easily, and loudly, share how much I loved it. Child of Light is a simple RPG from the Far Cry team at Ubisoft Montreal, believe it or not, and it’s possibly the most beautiful game I’ve seen this year. I annoyed the crap out of my Twitter friends thanks to the PlayStation 4’s way-too-easy-to-use share button. I mean, just look at this beauty.

Child of Light

Here’s a bit of what I wrote in my review for Action Trip:

Aurora, a little girl, is the game’s protagonist who collapses into a Sleeping Beauty-like coma shortly after her father remarries. Her body may be in a coma in the real world, but Aurora has awoken in the world of Lemuria, a fairy tale world that is under the harsh rule of Umbra, Queen of the Night. If Aurora wants to get back home and be reunited with her father, she must restore Lemuria back to its former glory and defeat the evil Queen.

Yes, this is generic and akin to every fairy tale ever written; go on ahead and roll your eyes. Continue rolling them, because the game goes as far as to rhyme everything. All dialogue and narration are told in a rhyme, and that is just as annoying as it sounds. Every time the partymembers stop to talk to one another in rhyme, which happens whenever you bring in a new friend, I constantly skip through it. At least only the narrator’s lines are spoken, so I’m not treated to an oral nursery rhyme every five minutes.

Those are really my only complaints, and it did not stop my enjoyment of the combat or the vast exploration the game offers.

And then I went on a complete gushfest from there.

The biggest complaint I heard from friends and other reviewers was that the game wasn’t very deep, but it was only $15. I think it was pretty deep for that little. Plus, it’s a fairy tale story; how deep did those really ever get?

Photo May 09, 3 25 04 PM

Besides, the amount of exploration, the combat, and the crafting really made up for anything the story might have lacked in terms of depth.

This is one RPG I can definitely recommend to everyone who has a PlayStation 4. I hope it’s this gorgeous on PlayStation 3, but I was blown away with how crisp and vibrant it looked on my PS4. But for $15, I think it would be worth the risk. It’s too fun to pass up.

Bound by Flame Mini-Review

By Leave a Comment

I don’t know if I have ever struggled to write a review as much as I have with Bound by Flame. I like the game, I really do, but it doesn’t have much in terms of innovation or originality. It obviously heavily relies upon inspiration from a few other popular RPGs like The Witcher, Dragon Age: Origins, Diablo, Skyrim, and Kingdoms of Amalur. However, I can’t say this is a bad thing, because what it does emulate, it emulates it very well.

The best way I can describe it is it’s as if the developers picked features from RPGs they liked best, worked them in, and gave them their own spin on it. It’s everything I have liked from these games, so yeah, I had a great time with Bound by Flame.

bound_by_flame-08

Here’s a sample of my review over on Action Trip:

Like all of these games mentioned–except for Diablo–the choices the player makes in the game affects the story’s outcome. Some of these choices are obvious, and sometimes they are subtle, such as failing to or opting to not complete certain side quests. The choices of the protagonist also affects how much of the fire demon she lets control her soul, which alters outward appearance, how she is treated, and of course, how the story goes. It’s this aspect that intrigued me the most about the game, and it’s definitely one thing the developer implemented very well and contained the most original thought. It’s a shame that story isn’t the most prevalent element here, but that’s most often the case with, well, a video game, and the story isn’t strong enough to make anyone look past the same gameplay found in several other RPGs.

Like Skyrim, Fable 2, and The Witcher, all combat is done in real-time. Players can slow down the battle when opening up a tactical menu to select a potion, a spell, or to give orders to the companion if there are any. Also like Skyrim, The Witcher, Dragon Age: Origins, and Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, players can tailor Vulcan to how they want to play with both skill trees and Features. Unlike all of those games, however, the skill trees are very, very simple, typically focusing on the three stances of combat: warrior, ranger, and pyromancer. Players can switch between these stances at any time during combat, so at one moment, Vulcan can be agile and quick, the next she can swing around a massive, two-handed sword, and then opt to fling fire spells.

At the very least, it picked some great games from to get ideas (well, except for Fable 2, but it made what Fable 2 was trying to do so much better).

bound_by_flame-10

And to be honest, I like Bound by Flame a whole lot more than I like Skyrim, as Skyrim had way too much freedom and too little direction for me to enjoy. Bound by Flame also makes me want to return to Kingdoms of Amalur and give that a bit more of a chance, and it’s reminded me that Dragon Age: Origins still beckons.

inFAMOUS Second Son Mini-Review

By Leave a Comment

infamoussecondson12I really don’t know what else to say about inFAMOUS Second Son that I haven’t bored you all with already. Right after I finished playing, I started a new playthrough for Evil Karma, and I’m still clearing out each district to 100% once again because the gameplay is just THAT fun.

So I’ll let my words from Action Trip do the talking.

The blast shards are not the only inFAMOUS staple that gets shoehorned into Second Son. One of the good karmic activities that Delsin can perform is the ability to heal random civilians. In inFAMOUS, this made sense, because 1) there was a plague going on and 2) the healing ability was suggested to Cole since he was virtually a walking defibrillator. How does zapping someone with smoke or any of Delsin’s other powers lead to healing?

The dead drop recordings have also returned to Second Son, but they feel just as forced as the healing of civilians. Before, the dead drops told the game’s backstory and provided a little more insight, and these do that a little bit, but the information isn’t as instrumental to the overall story as the dead drops have been in the past.

…

All of that said, the gameplay is so much fun, I really didn’t care about these issues or the fact that the NPCs rarely stop drinking their coffee when a war between Conduits erupts in the middle of a patio cafe. Is it annoying and yet humorous that I can literally run over NPCs while running and have them apologize to me each and every time? Completely. Is the spray paint art mini-game involving motion controls ridiculous? Very. But, I’m too busy enjoying finding every collectible, completing every side quest in each district, and running amok with Delsin’s powers to really care. I have always found joy in running around in the world of inFAMOUS almost more than the story itself, so all of these issues for the most part have bounced right off me.

If you have a PS4, I cannot recommend inFAMOUS Second Son enough, although it is a bit hard to recommend to anyone who hasn’t played at least one of them. The world is just a ton of fun, and I’m honestly contemplating going for a Platinum trophy in it. Thus far, only LEGO games have gotten that much attention from me.

Goat Simulator Mini-Review

By Leave a Comment

Yes, there is something called Goat Simulator, and yes I did review it for Action Trip.

I got interested in Goat Simulator thanks to the trailer below.

Delightfully, it met all of my expectations.

Goat Simulator does not have a deep narrative detailing the life of a goat. Instead, the goat you control is plunked down in an open world where you can do whatever you want with it. You can try to complete all of the little quests the game gives you, such as jumping over an obstacle or successfully landing a back-flip. But it’s far more fun to run amok, scare the crap out of people, and well, destroy things.

As soon as I discovered I wasn’t confined to do these quests that kept popping up on my HUD, I sent my goat through as many houses as I could, destroying property, licking random people (which scares the daylights out of them), and jumping out of windows. When I was curious to see if I could kill the goat–as I’m that kind of monster, apparently–I head-butted a gas station with explosive results. Not only did the goat not die, I earned a Michael Bay achievement.

Many people complained that it’s only great for 20 minutes or that it’s buggy as shit. The thing is that the studio has embraced the bugginess, refused to fix anything that isn’t game-breaking, and even tells consumers in the game description that their money would be better spent elsewhere. And yes, it may only be fun in 2o-minute bursts, but it’s a great game to just tool around in. Plus, with all of the mods now available, the goats and their environments only get more insane.

I don’t regret spending my $10 in the slightest.

South Park: The Stick of Truth Mini-Review

By Leave a Comment

201292bI was looking forward to South Park: The Stick of Truth since it was first announced, and my excitement for it was only enhanced when I saw a live demo at San Diego Comic Con in 2012. I was honestly afraid that it wouldn’t live up to the hype, especially after my disappointment with BioShock Infinite. Ten minutes into the game, I knew I was going to love it. That love never wavered for a minute.

I reviewed the game in full for Action Trip. Here’s a snippet of my thoughts:

Ten minutes into playing South Park: The Stick of Truth, I’m looking over my class selection which includes a Jew and wondering why I thought I could give my character any other name besides “Douchebag.” This is South Park; of course I’m going to be called Douchebag. That’s me, Douchebag the Jew. My character is wielding a shepherd’s crook and wearing a yarmulke. Kids are yelling more f-bombs than I think I heard in Spec Ops: The Line, if that’s possible. Cartman is teaching me how to “cast spells” a/k/a fart on dummies.This is South Park, and if you get offended easily, just walk away now. Like the TV show, this game isn’t, and never will be for you. And that’s just the start of how wonderful this game is.

When I finished South Park: The Stick of Truth, I was honestly sad it was over. I usually get to a point in games, no matter the length, where I’m ready for it to be over already and I never got there with this one. I put off the final battles for so long, making sure I really and truly completed every last available side quest.

The game had its problems, such as responsiveness with some of the controls, but it never took away from my enjoyment. I said in 2012 that this would be the game of the year whenever it released, and two years later, I’m still holding that claim.

Top Posts & Pages