Two Point Hospital Review – A Bittersweet Pill

Medical careers are highly rewarding, but they can also be stressful, tedious, and full of high-stakes choices. Two Point Hospital dramatically diminishes those stakes, because in this topsy-turvy world, patients contract diseases like Premature Mummification and seek treatment in cartoonishly large injection machines. Like real hospital work, managing this network of treatment centers is satisfying – but Two Point Hospital can’t do away with the tedium of routine.

Two Point Studios is composed of ex-Lionhead and Bullfrog developers who previously worked on franchises like Fable, Theme Park, and Populous. Over 20 years ago, its core team created the beloved management sim Theme Hospital, and now its creators are back for more hospital hijinx with a long-awaited spiritual successor that matches the goofy tone and deep management layers of the original.

Playing Theme Hospital isn’t a prerequisite for Two Point Hospital. The opening hours do a nice job easing in new players. You manage every aspect of a hospital, including hiring (and firing) doctors, constructing new treatment wards, and ensuring that your patients remain at a comfortable temperature. Two Point Hospital features a variety of interlocking systems, but I never felt overwhelmed. The game does a great job notifying you about problems that deserve your attention, like when I needed to hire more janitors because my hospital was a garbage pit, or when my nurses felt underpaid and became disgruntled.

Your ultimate goal is to travel to every hospital in the county and improve their overall ratings. The easiest way to turn a death pit into a three-star hospital is by completing missions. Early on, these simple tasks ask players to cure a certain number of patients or build a specific facility. These goals get more interesting after you unlock marketing, training, and research facilities. At one point, I was tasked with curing 10 patients of lycanthropy, but patients with that disease weren’t checking into my hospital, so I ran a marketing campaign to attract new patients and researched a better treatment to improve my hospital’s reputation. After that, my beds filled quickly.

Two Point Hospital’s management layers are deep. You can micromanage your employees’ break times and pore over profit/loss spreadsheets. This level of detail feels like boring paperwork, but like most hospital records, they are a necessary evil. Two Point’s automated systems keep your hospital running, but if you want to max out your facility’s efficiency and earn a three-star rating, you need to scrutinize these stats. At one point, as I looked over my staff sheet, I discovered that one doctor was killing more patients than they were helping, so I quickly axed them and hired a more skilled surgeon.

I had more fun building new treatment wings and decking the halls with surreal paintings. My early hospitals all looked similar. As I progressed, I unlocked new medical equipment and currency used to purchase new decorations and novelty items. As I gained a wider range of decor, I felt a greater ownership over my hospitals. The simple click-and-drag interface also allows you to move entire rooms around within a building (even after they’ve been constructed), so mistakes are easy to paper over, and massive remodeling projects are a snap. Even late in the game, I was tinkering with the layout of each ward. I enjoyed designing each GP’s office around a specific theme, and my patients were pretty happy when I added a mini-arcade to the waiting room.

While I loved playing interior decorator, I quickly grew tired of doing it over and over again. Each time you move to a new location in Two Point County, you have to rebuild your hospital again from the ground up. Late in the game, it can take an hour or more just to get your hospital to a point where it meets all the basic functions. Since the game has over a dozen hospitals, you spend a lot of time reliving the basics. This slog is necessary to unlock new treatment rooms and tools, so I always felt the pressure to move on to a new hospital and start from scratch.

Two Point Studio has done a remarkable job reviving Theme Hospital and repackaging its concept for a modern audience. I loved Two Point’s distinct charm and the thrill of researching treatments for absurd diseases. But the tiresome grind eventually wears down even the best parts of the experience. Like an actual hospital visit, I’m glad I went, but I’m not particularly excited to return.

 

Pro Evolution Soccer 2019 Review – Moments Of Magic

Control has always been one of the masterstrokes of the PES franchise – particularly the ability to express yourself on the pitch, making even those small touches of the ball important. PES 2019 continues this glorious tradition in new ways, but it’s juxtaposed by the A.I., which is out of your control, predictable in its attack, and executes questionable transfer business. PES 2019 hits more highs than previous iterations, but it’s also bumping up against its own ceiling.

Last year, PES slowed its gameplay speed down, which made it feel better and more exacting, and this year expands the level of detail with the way players react – sometimes unsuccessfully – to the ball. The added variance in passes, even when they go slightly astray, introduces a realistic dynamic to the game. It’s exhilarating to see your striker try to control the ball with an extra touch on the outside of his boot while he’s on the full gallop. Even when he subsequently fires the ball into the side netting because the angle got worse as he quickly approaches the byline, it’s a nice dose of realism. I liked having to be more aware of how players receive passes, their fatigue level, and even that a through ball may go out of bounds, further separating the good players from the average.

The gameplay still has its faults, however, such as how players’ legs clip through each other and how pre-determined animations can take away some control. Unlike last year, it feels like player switching can sometimes leave you at a disadvantage because of whom you’re given. The A.I. also wears out its welcome in that its attack is predominately down the flanks, and defenders can switch off at times.

The A.I. further exposes its faults in the Master League career mode, because it’s unable to steward non-player-controlled teams through transfer windows without dangerously thinning the squad depth in some positions while going on a spending spree for others. Similarly, transfer amounts don’t reflect the craziness of the real world, and old stars (and even good-but-not-great players) hold on to their value too much in comparison with hot up-and-comers.

This is a shame because the mode offers a lot of depth when it comes to building a squad of champions. I like the team roles that give bonuses for the whole squad, the ability to direct whether funds go into you transfer or salary budgets, and the new manager missions (in Master League’s Challenge setting) that task you with goals from the owner.

The mode is great about assembling your team and training them up, but it’s not as good at doing the same for the rest of the league. It’s not a question of just having more or certain league/team licenses. It’s that the world outside of your team doesn’t come across nearly as well. This comes down to not only the A.I.’s transfer behavior, but players’ listed personalities don’t manifest themselves in being unsettled and wanting a transfer, and fans, rivalries, and the larger league context barely give the mode a broader focus. 

It remains to be seen how a larger scope might affect this year’s MyClub fantasy mode, which needs more post-launch competitions and other competitive and even single-player ways to play than last year. Like Master League mode, it’s fun to grow your team through training (as opposed to lusting after the card du jour), but even with the awesome co-op play, it stalls if you have to grind the same tournaments and ranked matches.

It’s easy for me to sit and revel in what I love about PES, jogging through instant replay just to gawk at a foot flick a ball on to a teammate or charting out the future of my Master League club. But occasionally that reverence is broken by an ill-suited moment that illustrates that more work needs to be done. The franchise is steps away from greatness, which makes some of its foibles frustrating.

The Messenger Review – A Tale Of Two Games

Retro throwbacks are a dime a dozen these days, with independent developers paying loving homage to the games they grew up with. The Ninja Gaiden-inspired action platformer The Messenger accomplishes this feat while simultaneously subverting the genre in multiple ways.

The Messenger puts you in the tabi of a young ninja chosen to fulfill a prophecy and combat a curse overtaking the land. The 2D adventure tasks you with traveling through myriad diverse regions on your way to the frozen peak. During your travels, you must conquer death-defying platforming sequences that require precision controls. Whether you’re jumping from ledge to preciously placed ledge or unsheathing your sword into the face of an enemy, The Messenger’s controls are as tight and responsive as they come.

You start with a basic moveset of jump and attack, with the ability to cloudstep, an extra mid-air jump granted each time you perform a successful attack. That small restriction on double jumps sets you up for intricate sequences of slashing enemies, projectiles, and environment items to cross long gaps or collect currency suspended over spikes. This simple moveset carries with you through the game, but your arsenal expands with access to new abilities like climbing and gliding. My favorite acquired ability is a grapple rope, which latches on to nearby enemies, walls, and hooks, opening a host of thrilling platforming opportunities.

You can acquire several other upgrades by trading in time shards you collect during your travels. Time shards are obtained by exploring levels, defeating enemies, and smashing environment items. The upgrades range from invaluable abilities like being able to destroy enemy projectiles to quality-of-life luxuries like revealing the locations of hidden collectibles. Filling out the upgrade tree is rewarding and makes collecting as many time shards as possible an essential goal.

The Messenger may be a love letter to the action platformers of yesteryear, but it modernizes the formula in multiple ways. One of the biggest upgrades is foregoing the traditional extra lives and continue systems. Instead, each time you die – and you’ll likely die a good amount – a minion named Quarble resurrects you at the last checkpoint. However, he doesn’t do this out of the goodness of his heart; he follows you around for a bit after you respawn, stealing away any time shards you collect until your debt is paid. I vastly prefer this approach to respawning over the antiquating lives system, as this prevents frustration from losing too much progress while also making each death consequential. Quarble also makes amusing, fourth-wall breaking remarks upon each death. It doesn’t happen often, but the characters you interact with throughout the world often deliver humorous dialogue that pokes fun at you, as well as standard conventions of the action-platform genre.

Once you progress far enough, you unlock the ability to travel forward in time thousands of years. This leap is represented by a move from 8-bit to 16-bit graphics. When you emerge into the future, the backgrounds are lush and immediately noticeable, and while the character sprites receive noticeable upgrades, they aren’t as jarringly different as expected. The areas are largely the same in both periods of time, but some walls and ledges are in different places, leading to exciting, yet simple puzzles as you jump between the graphical styles to coordinate to progress through a screen.

Tearing through the first half of The Messenger is among my favorite experiences all year. Its curated, linear format delivers a perfectly paced adventure that had me itching to play the next stage each time I vanquished the prior level’s boss. Every time a checkpoint rewarded shuriken and health, I felt a mix of dread and excitement as I readied for the challenge ahead. Each boss challenges you in unique ways, ranging from massive monsters with lasers and projectiles to smaller adversaries that jump around the screen and attack you up close.

 

Halfway through the game, The Messenger throws a massive curveball your way in the form of a genre shift. The adventure changes from a linear, stage-based experience to a Metroid-inspired game with labyrinthine areas, fast travel, and riddles hinting at where to find collectibles needed to reach the final area. I typically enjoy this brand of exploration-based platforming, but the whiplash-inducing change disrupts the pacing and swaps out a tight formula that was working well for one that, while functional, is less fun.

In doing away with the linear structure, The Messenger instead relies on clues given by a character. While some hints are obvious, others had me running in circles for a while before I figured them out. You can pay a few hundred time shards to decode the riddle and place a marker on your map (I often opted for this method), but if you want to save up shards for the newly expanded upgrade tree, you have some tough decisions to make. Fortunately, by the time I found all the collectibles, I had collected enough shards to max out the skill tree before the final trek. After a hefty helping of back-tracking through areas you already played through in a better format, you finally return to a style resembling the first half of the game.

While the Metroidvania approach doesn’t play into The Messenger’s strengths as much as the linear stages, it’s far from a deal breaker. Regardless of its mid-game identity crisis, tight controls, excellent platforming, and exciting combat make The Messenger a retro journey worth embarking on.

Dragon Quest XI: Echoes Of An Elusive Age Review

As the longest-running Japanese RPG series, Dragon Quest has never strayed too far from its classic roots. If you’re a fan, you know what to expect: turn-based combat, a silent protagonist, and a grand adventure to save the world. In some ways, this franchise shows its age. In others, it’s a great reminder of what made RPGs fun in the first place, with epic boss battles, hidden treasure, and party members who grow on and off the battlefield. Dragon Quest XI retains this satisfying progression, but it doesn't reinvent or modernize the series.

Saving the world is a common goal in gaming; who doesn’t want to be a hero and overcome daunting odds? Dragon Quest XI embraces this fully. You play as “The Luminary,” a boy fated from birth to be the savior from dark forces threatening the land. The plot isn’t groundbreaking and takes its sweet time to get going, but some clever twists along the way make your patience pay off. Moreover, the way party members come together is well done, especially as you explore their backstories and discover why they ended up on the path to help. While there are plenty of dramatic moments, the game doesn’t take itself too seriously; the series’ trademark humor is intact, including the lighthearted NPC dialogue, silly costumes, and pun-filled monster names. 

The core gameplay remains simple but fun, showing that the turn-based combat can still be intense. I especially love the challenging boss battles. Outsmarting your opponent requires using buffs, focusing on healing, and making the most of your pep powers. The latter is like the tension system in previous games, randomly activating a temporary heightened state to land criticals and perform powerful combo attacks. Pep powers require you to make the most of your turns due to their unpredictable nature. I enjoyed using them to play into my strategy, leveraging my powerful state for as long as possible by using normal strikes before I unleashed my combo attacks, since that ends the character’s pep state.

 

You can only have four active members in your party, but you have multiple heroes to choose from to suit your play style. I appreciate the variety of the weapons and specialties each one adds to the mix. For instance, Erik is a thief focused on trickery and agility, while a support character like Serena has restorative magic and buffs. The members all feel balanced, having their own strengths and weaknesses, giving you a lot of options for your loadout. Serena may be a mage, but she can still wield a spear to make her more attack-oriented. 

Characters automatically receive new skills and stat boosts, but you also have some control over their growth via the character builder. Leveling up grants you points that unlock new attributes, like more proficiency with a weapon, restoring MP after battle, or taking advantage of specialty skills. For instance, Sylvando is a showman, so you can exploit his charm abilities. This new, accessible skill system works well, as it lets you focus on specific categories for each character by unlocking nodes on a hexagonal grid that then open up more options for battle. I loved saving up my skill points and watching the dividends pay off with game-changing abilities, whether it was a new devastating attack or gaining the chance to cast two spells in a row for the cost of one. Throw in collecting materials to forge better armor, and you’re always shooting for the next best thing, which provides motivation to explore. 

With activities like gambling, treasure hunts, and locating collectibles, the world has plenty to do – but it’s just not impressive. The side content is mostly tedious fetch quests. In addition, everything feels behind the times. The length between save points can be brutal, and sometimes you can lose a whole dungeon’s worth of progress by hitting the challenging end boss with no save point in sight. Some late bosses require grinding if you want to succeed; I thrive on challenging bosses that test my mastery of the battle system, but even if you play your cards just right, sometimes it just comes down to needing to gain levels in these battles of attrition. 

Thankfully, some more archaic elements have been improved, such as a handy heal button that automatically restores health and cures status ailments in the most optimal way possible for the party. Fast travel is at its best, as you no longer have to be out of a dungeon to take advantage of it with the Zoom spell. You can also mount various creatures and they are cleverly used in dungeons, whether they help you charge to break walls, jump to high ledges, or fly over water. That being said, the recycled dungeons (especially once on the true ending path) almost killed my enthusiasm to keep playing. The game demands you put up with some repetition to get to its sweeter rewards. 

Dragon Quest XI stays to true the series’ sense of adventure, and the long journey culminates in something cool for longtime fans (be sure to reload your save after the credits roll). I had my share of fun, especially as someone who grew up with the franchise and could appreciate the callbacks littered throughout. At times, I was glued to my controller as I discovered the next village, plot revelation, or impressive boss. Dragon Quest has stuck around for a reason: It does what it does well, and the formula still works. However, Dragon Quest XI’s lack of evolution is a hindrance. It’s about time the series took some risks.

Donut County Review – Controlling A Compelling Nuisance

If some strange person were to run up to you on the street and feverishly ask you to explain what an indie game is, Donut County might be the perfect example to offer that weirdo. The experience is built around a bizarre (but easy-to-understand) mechanic, and it’s all wrapped up in a quirky story that you can finish in one memorable-but-strange sitting.

In Donut County, you control a hole. You move the hole along the ground, placing it below assorted objects and creatures so they fall in. As you swallow more objects, the hole gets larger, allowing you to eat up bigger objects. You may start by dropping rocks and traffic cones into your pit, but by the end of the level, you are large enough to take down entire buildings. The act of being a nuisance to the folks of Donut County by dropping their assorted possessions into the hole in order to progressively increase your ability to be obnoxious is a malicious joy. Comparisons can be drawn between Donut County and Katamari Damacy (which is about gathering junk with an ever-growing sticky ball), and though Donut County never reaches the same heights, I felt many of the same joyous emotions while playing.

Dropping things into a seemingly bottomless hole is fun on its own, but your abilities expand as you progress, opening the doors for some interesting puzzles. You learn to launch objects back out of the hole to hit switches or knock things off of shelves, and you can fill the hole with water to short electrical wires. None of the puzzles are challenging, but figuring out how to use a hole to do odd tasks like mix soup inside of it while avoiding hungry bugs offers a pleasant-but-simple sense of achievement. It also ensures that each level feels like a separate little adventure.

In tandem with the weird premise is a story with a cast of characters individually affected by the hole. Each level is flanked by a short dialogue amongst the group who are trying to escape the underground they have fallen into. The clear blame for the hole calamity belongs with BK the raccoon, who casually tries to defend himself to the angry group, leading to some funny conversations. The finale also mixes up the formula in a climactic way I won’t spoil, but is fun to play and a nice resolution to the story.

 

Donut County is a short experience, clocking in at about two hours, but it’s a lean two hours free of extraneous gameplay. I enjoyed every level, but the lack of depth means the goofy premise of sucking a town underground piece by piece doesn’t feel fully explored by the end. I wanted to use the hole in larger locations and use its excellent physics to solve more complicated puzzles. Even if its ambitions are straightforward, Donut County offers a unique experience that is silly, easy to understand, and fun to play.

Yakuza Kiwami 2 Review – Leader Of The Pack

Little Dragons Café Review – Shut It Down!

Guacamelee 2 Review – An Excellent But Familiar Return To The Ring

The first Guacamelee didn’t demand a sequel. It told a succinct and satisfying story, and fully explored its mechanics while nailing the Metroid style of exploration. Guacamelee 2 doesn’t radically change the gameplay established by the first game, but with myriad combat and platforming improvements, a worthwhile story, and better challenges, this is the follow-up I didn’t know I wanted.

Guacamelee 2 picks up seven years after the events of the original game’s good ending. Juan is a family man now, raising his children with his wife who is working on her dissertation. Though his life is different, the gameplay remains familiar; the excellent formula established in the previous entry carries forward and remains strong. Juan is thrust back into the hero role, exploring a connected world, fighting enemies, and finding new abilities that unlock new routes. The areas are designed well and overall do a great job leading you down a path to discover something and then giving you a shortcut back to the starting line toward your next destination. It means you rarely get lost or have to backtrack through the labyrinth and you get to see exciting new areas and challenges at a steady clip.

Juan also earns the ability early on to swap dimensions at will and jump between the world of the living and the dead. The level layout does not change when you swap, but platforms may disappear, and areas that were previously safe may suddenly become lethal. This leads to some of the most engaging challenges as you swap between dimensions to avoid danger while doing high-speed platforming and defeating enemies. The mechanic appeared in the first game, and it’s still clever as hell – though it hasn’t been changed or improved for the sequel.

Both the combat and platforming boast incredibly precise controls. Building up big combos against enemies is fun and gets easier as you level up your special attacks, which happen to double as navigation tools. The uppercut functions as a double jump, and plays into a clever mechanic where breaking through the shields of certain enemies requires specific attacks. A glowing blue enemy requires Juan’s sideways thrust ability which also breaks blue doors, and gives the extra distance often needed to hit a just out-of-reach ledge. This shield-breaking system means you are constantly using Juan’s entire arsenal of moves, preventing you from relying on a favorite attack and approaching fights a little bit like a puzzle. It made every battle consistently exciting.

Along with dimension swapping and all of his combat and navigation abilities, Juan can also turn into a chicken to enter small tunnels. The chicken can do nearly everything Juan can, including fight. In the first game, the chicken felt like a significantly weaker version of Juan that was required for certain platforming sequences, but here the chicken form feels like an extension of Juan with its own additional distinct abilities like being to dash upward through the air multiple times and dash over spike pits with ease.

The world is littered with isolated platforming challenges that test Juan’s limits and the player’s abilities, but you don’t need to complete all of them to see the end credits. One has you climbing high into the sky frequently swapping back and forth between chicken and human, while another places you on a dead sprint to avoid the dimension where the world is full of lava. I eagerly embraced these gauntlets whenever I came across them because they offer big rewards and they are quick and easy to retry when you fail.

Local co-op now supports four players instead of two. Having the option to play with up to four people (who can drop in and out as they please) is awesome, but I had the most fun exploring Guacamelee 2 as a single-player game. The combat works well with multiple players, but the platforming trials, especially the later ones that test your ability to swap between dimensions and chicken and human form on the fly, are made harder by the distraction of having multiple players on screen.

 

Guacamelee 2 is not afraid to put its influences on display at every opportunity. Allusions to other games as well as assorted pop-culture references litter the various billboards across the world, but you also find more direct references. An early joke paints the world to look like Playdead’s Limbo, while another has you beating up a car just like Street Fighter II’s bonus stage. These references are off the beaten path and serve as fun (and typically optional) rewards for exploring every inch of the world, and I was always eager to uncover them.

As you might guess from the abundant references, the narrative never takes itself too seriously. However, amid the jokes, the sincerity surrounding the relationships Juan has with his friends and family are treated with a great deal of respect. Seeing different versions of characters in different timelines is interesting and both of the endings are satisfying in surprisingly sweet ways. If you plan on seeing the best ending, I highly recommending beating it once before hitting 100% in order to see both ways the story concludes. It’s worth it.

Guacamelee 2 is one of the best executions of the Metroid formula. Juan’s adventure stands apart in a crowded genre, even if it stands apart in the same ways as his last outing. Combat is always exciting, the upgrades change the way you fight and navigate the world in meaningful ways, the world is well-designed, and the optional challenges are substantial and rewarding.

World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth Review - Successfully Landing On Stormy Shores

The last World of Warcraft expansion, Legion, played with huge stakes in terms of player advancement and changes to systems and mechanics. Battle for Azeroth stands in its shadow in some respects, gently finessing some of those systems and providing a wealth of content, but dialing back the wow factor of acquiring legendary artifact weapons and unleashing them on the Burning Legion. Battle for Azeroth is a subtler ride, focusing more on impressive new environments and cool characters than sweeping transformation.

World quests, artifact power, and much of the excellent endgame fare introduced in Legion is back, though progression outside of leveling is now a bit different. Instead of powering up a single item in a somewhat linear fashion, artifact power now charges up several different gear slots - and you are always be on the lookout for items to drop to fill these instead of a singular static piece. Each of these pieces has different choices to make in terms of how to use your artifact power, so it keeps the desire strong to keep finding new loot. While the effects are dialed back compared to the flashy powers on artifact weapons, I greatly enjoy the fact that I'm constantly making choices and collecting pieces. That said, with no new abilities or talents on the way to level 120 from 110 and the lack of exciting artifact traits, my character doesn't feel much different now than it did years ago.

The two new island continents are great zones to explore, with a variety of biomes and experiences, capitalizing on themes of seafaring, pirates, old gods, and dinosaurs. It's an ambitious, almost zany fantasy fusion that somehow works. Players face a constant barrage of additional things to do as they knock out traditional quests, like tracking down chests and rare monsters. The trail of breadcrumbs from activity to activity is engaging and keeps interest high as you move between objectives.

 

New zones are at their best on the Horde side. Your first visit to Zuldazar is breathtaking; it’s a massive capital city that makes Dalaran, Orgimmar, and Stormwind look pedestrian. The island is dotted with thematic and fun experiences, many of them involving blood trolls, loa, or a lot of awesome dinosaurs. It is also home to great new characters like the dark-deal-making Bwonsamdi. The island and its inhabitants take clear inspiration from Haitian Voodoo, but the colorful World of Warcraft slant is surprisingly effective, and kept me interested through the leveling journey.

The quality of dungeon content is all over the place. Waycrest Manor is the high note, as players explore a haunted house full of strange denizens and wafting organ notes coming up from the basement below. It feels almost like an old-school, mini-Karazhan – a haunted place with solid variety in encounters and nice pacing. On the other end of the spectrum are dungeons like The Motherlode, which is a long and uninspired corridor full of a forgettable pile of trash monsters to wade through.

In addition to traditional dungeons, island expeditions are randomized three-person scenarios that don't require any specific group composition to tackle. These can be completed as bite-sized content for an artifact power boost; players get a bit of it for each run, but get a huge influx for completing enough each week. I love the variance of the different expeditions here. Your opponents are different each time, and factor into how you have to engage. You may face a more passive team looking to get points by killing monsters, or you may run into the Worgen band that tracks you down and attempts to kill you over and over. Changing up your strategy based on what you find is great fun, but the rewards don't really merit engaging after you've hit your weekly payload. You can also play this mode in PVP mode against actual other players, which can add yet alother layer of strategy to the battle and you'll get some additional rewards, but I prefer to go up against the interesting preconstructed PVE compositions. Just not those Worgen. They'll never stop hunting you!

And what of the war? As you progress, you slowly unlock new footholds in enemy territory. Some of this is reputation-gated, so it's difficult to make headway at first, but it's a clever way to drip out new outposts in “hostile” lands. Truth be told, unless you have war mode enabled (consensual PVP), most of the time spent in enemy territory outside of specific missions doesn't feel very warlike and feels like more of the same stuff you're doing on allied ground. Despite the highly questionable lead up into the war spurred by Sylvanas, I'm more than happy to mess with Alliance holdings under the command of her champion Nathanos Blightcaller, who adds a little spark and spice to each deed done in the name of the Horde. 

Living up to the standard set by Legion, one of World of Warcraft’s best expansions ever, is an almost impossible task. Battle for Azeroth isn’t quite there yet. With warfronts, raids, and more story beats coming in the future, that may change. For now, the only thing for certain is that World of Warcraft still captures the MMORPG magic. And now that magic has dinosaurs. 
 

F1 2018 Review – A Real Team Effort

I’m not an F1 aficionado, but I appreciate the sheer effort by the drivers and race teams to be the best on and off the track. That passion comes through in a relatable way in F1 2018, a title that constantly pushes you to excel while also giving you the tools to reach victory.

The impressive part of F1 2018’s career mode isn’t just the nooks and crannies of the R&D tech tree (now with a fog of war), it’s the way everything nestles together. Your actions and decisions reverberate around your racing organization, letting you feel the enormity of the task, but also making it relatable and within reach. Yes, you’re just one person in this mammoth enterprise, but this is one instance where the right hand actually knows what the left hand is doing.

It’s the first of three pre-qualification practices, and a good way to get to know the track is to go through the Track Acclimatization program (hitting the right gates into/out of turns) for some resource points. These are spent on the R&D tree between race weekends. I’m not sure which direction to go in, so the engineer for my Renault team recommends new pistons. Sounds good. I’m rivals with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, so I can’t shrug off these practice programs before the race. I need to earn resource points to keep pace with Red Bull’s own R&D advances as well in order to be competitive on the track.

During the ensuing race, I’m told my internal combustion engine (ICE) is losing power, which partly explains why I’m getting caught on the straightaways – that and Lewis Hamilton is just going to do that until our organization improves. I make a mental note to check to see how much wear is on the current ICE and whether I need to fit a new one.

After the race I put in a new one and check the rest of my power unit and gearbox for wear. Luckily nothing else needs replacing for the moment. The rest of the news, however, isn’t good. The streamlined suspension arms the aero team started work on a few weeks ago have arrived but they failed test, which means I have to spend more points to have them redone.

Ironically, the next time I’m in front of the press, I’m sure to mention how good my aero department is, which boosts their morale and cuts down the chance of such failures happening again. I also plug my chassis department. I’m eyeing new calipers, and I’d like to keep the discount I currently have running with them.

Towards the end of the season we’re blindsided with the news that regulations next season are going to wipe out three aero upgrades. Although they remain viable for the current season, I have to spend over 1,000 points to keep them for next year.

Come contract time I’ve earned enough respect with my bosses through my finishes, rivalry wins (including one with my teammate), and performance in invitational events, that I’m in a place to negotiate an upgrade in the R&D time as well as a bump in the amount of resource points I get for races. I’m on my way up in the world, but it’s just the start.

As busy as it may sound, getting elbows deep into your race team isn’t overwhelming because it’s well organized. It’s more about putting one foot in front of the other than herding kittens. You can run through seven different practice programs over three practice sessions, which are more than enough opportunities to get resource points. Although the programs are the same through your entire career, they’re both instructional and applicable to each race. For instance, the fuel economy program shows you how to conserve fuel for the track as well as lets the team know how little fuel they can get away with during the race while still running good laps.

 

The game keeps you busy, but it doesn’t gussy up the daily grind. Some of the race intro/exit cutscenes are the same as previous years, the interview sessions (as useful as they are) grow stale, and even with the rivalries and having to throw divisions of your R&D department under the bus to the media at times, the game has an air of restraint. Unfortunately, it doesn’t indulge in the sport’s drama, and even your successes feel muted.

That changes when you’re racing, thankfully. The cars’ handling conveys both the enormous power at your disposal and the subtle skill needed to master it entering and exiting corners. During the longer races you notice things like tire wear, the type of tires you’re using, and the importance of keeping out of danger. One race I slightly damage my front wing, meaning I had to deal with understeer until it was fixed.

Racing is a mix of the immediate (the next corner) with the long-term (your pit and tire strategy) that can be challenging. My brain scrambled when my engineer announced rain was on the way. Not only do I hate driving in the stuff, but I had to grapple with that devil’s proposition of how long I could stay out before it hit. A handy in-race HUD gives information and allows adjustments while you’re driving, but it can be a handful to read and bring up while you’re in the thick of the action. Plus, some of the options like the fuel mixture and the differential are not well explained. Thankfully, handling the new ERS – a system that recovers and deploys energy while you’re driving – is easier to use.

In addition to career mode, F1 2018 also features one-off scenario events, a 22-player multiplayer mode with ranked/unranked sections with a new leveling system for matchmaking, and your customary time trial and other exhibition races. These modes, however, are not the stars of the show.

Racing games are all about strapping yourself in behind the wheel and chasing that checkered flag, but you can’t forget all the hard work put in just to get you to the start/finish line in the first place. F1 2018’s excellent career mode skillfully lets you enjoy the fruits of both labors.

F1 2018 Review – A Real Team Effort

I’m not an F1 aficionado, but I appreciate the sheer effort by the drivers and race teams to be the best on and off the track. That passion comes through in a relatable way in F1 2018, a title that constantly pushes you to excel while also giving you the tools to reach victory.

The impressive part of F1 2018’s career mode isn’t just the nooks and crannies of the R&D tech tree (now with a fog of war), it’s the way everything nestles together. Your actions and decisions reverberate around your racing organization, letting you feel the enormity of the task, but also making it relatable and within reach. Yes, you’re just one person in this mammoth enterprise, but this is one instance where the right hand actually knows what the left hand is doing.

It’s the first of three pre-qualification practices, and a good way to get to know the track is to go through the Track Acclimatization program (hitting the right gates into/out of turns) for some resource points. These are spent on the R&D tree between race weekends. I’m not sure which direction to go in, so the engineer for my Renault team recommends new pistons. Sounds good. I’m rivals with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, so I can’t shrug off these practice programs before the race. I need to earn resource points to keep pace with Red Bull’s own R&D advances as well in order to be competitive on the track.

During the ensuing race, I’m told my internal combustion engine (ICE) is losing power, which partly explains why I’m getting caught on the straightaways – that and Lewis Hamilton is just going to do that until our organization improves. I make a mental note to check to see how much wear is on the current ICE and whether I need to fit a new one.

After the race I put in a new one and check the rest of my power unit and gearbox for wear. Luckily nothing else needs replacing for the moment. The rest of the news, however, isn’t good. The streamlined suspension arms the aero team started work on a few weeks ago have arrived but they failed test, which means I have to spend more points to have them redone.

Ironically, the next time I’m in front of the press, I’m sure to mention how good my aero department is, which boosts their morale and cuts down the chance of such failures happening again. I also plug my chassis department. I’m eyeing new calipers, and I’d like to keep the discount I currently have running with them.

Towards the end of the season we’re blindsided with the news that regulations next season are going to wipe out three aero upgrades. Although they remain viable for the current season, I have to spend over 1,000 points to keep them for next year.

Come contract time I’ve earned enough respect with my bosses through my finishes, rivalry wins (including one with my teammate), and performance in invitational events, that I’m in a place to negotiate an upgrade in the R&D time as well as a bump in the amount of resource points I get for races. I’m on my way up in the world, but it’s just the start.

As busy as it may sound, getting elbows deep into your race team isn’t overwhelming because it’s well organized. It’s more about putting one foot in front of the other than herding kittens. You can run through seven different practice programs over three practice sessions, which are more than enough opportunities to get resource points. Although the programs are the same through your entire career, they’re both instructional and applicable to each race. For instance, the fuel economy program shows you how to conserve fuel for the track as well as lets the team know how little fuel they can get away with during the race while still running good laps.

 

The game keeps you busy, but it doesn’t gussy up the daily grind. Some of the race intro/exit cutscenes are the same as previous years, the interview sessions (as useful as they are) grow stale, and even with the rivalries and having to throw divisions of your R&D department under the bus to the media at times, the game has an air of restraint. Unfortunately, it doesn’t indulge in the sport’s drama, and even your successes feel muted.

That changes when you’re racing, thankfully. The cars’ handling conveys both the enormous power at your disposal and the subtle skill needed to master it entering and exiting corners. During the longer races you notice things like tire wear, the type of tires you’re using, and the importance of keeping out of danger. One race I slightly damage my front wing, meaning I had to deal with understeer until it was fixed.

Racing is a mix of the immediate (the next corner) with the long-term (your pit and tire strategy) that can be challenging. My brain scrambled when my engineer announced rain was on the way. Not only do I hate driving in the stuff, but I had to grapple with that devil’s proposition of how long I could stay out before it hit. A handy in-race HUD gives information and allows adjustments while you’re driving, but it can be a handful to read and bring up while you’re in the thick of the action. Plus, some of the options like the fuel mixture and the differential are not well explained. Thankfully, handling the new ERS – a system that recovers and deploys energy while you’re driving – is easier to use.

In addition to career mode, F1 2018 also features one-off scenario events, a 22-player multiplayer mode with ranked/unranked sections with a new leveling system for matchmaking, and your customary time trial and other exhibition races. These modes, however, are not the stars of the show.

Racing games are all about strapping yourself in behind the wheel and chasing that checkered flag, but you can’t forget all the hard work put in just to get you to the start/finish line in the first place. F1 2018’s excellent career mode skillfully lets you enjoy the fruits of both labors.

Phantom Doctrine Review – A Slow But Satisfying Burn

Hollow Knight Review - Climbing To The Top Of The Genre

The Metroid series has inspired countless games, and while some of them borrow the sci-fi premise and setting, the sense of progression is what seems to captivate most developers. At its core, the genre is about exploring an interconnected world and gaining abilities to get to new areas within it. Hollow Knight falls within this common category, but quickly distinguishes itself as both an adept emulation of the genre’s brightest stars and a unique melding of different ideas. The action, tone, and world design of Hollow Knight set it apart from what has come before. 

Players take on the role of the Knight, an inky black creature with a white mask sitting at the head of their nameless, genderless body. Armed with a sword, the Knight enters the long-dead kingdom of Hallownest. The action starts off fairly simple; you have a short-range attack and the ability to move around. As you progress, the Knight obtains spells and charms, building a steady sense of mutability to the way you move and attack that builds on top of itself. The Knight gains the ability to dash early on, with a later optional skill making the duration of the dash invulnerable to enemy attacks. Adding a charm on top of that not only extends the dash, but makes it cause damage, letting you effectively control how you backtrack through areas and what you prioritize.

This flexibility gives you room to experiment with your builds based on the situation. For general exploration, I kept a non-specific setup that showed where I was on the map and gathered resources from enemies, but I ended up changing it for different bosses. Sometimes tanking a boss wouldn’t work and I would have to alter a charm set to better promote evasion while I learned the pattern. I ended up trying three wildly different builds on the final boss until I determined what worked for me. The elasticity makes Hollow Knight feel fresh within its classic skeleton, giving me the opportunity to not only decide the way I wanted to both fight and explore, but to change things up as new situations demanded. Experimenting only costs the time it takes to reconfigure your charms in the menu, and that process sometimes reveals unexpected paths to success. At times, I bashed my head against a boss fight only to discover far more passive solutions, like protecting myself against smaller enemies with an aura of damage, or hiding in a corner and unleashing newborn bugs to fight in my stead. Not every fight needs to be settled with a sword.

Hallownest features many distinct, interconnected areas . The labyrinthine tunnels require a good sense of internal mapping, especially during the first hour when orientation is essentially left to your own memory. Afterwards, you build maps of what you’ve seen whenever you rest at a save point. You also see your location on the map, but players who get easily lost are going to have a difficult time figuring out their heading. While this first hour could easily turn off some players, wandering around without a safety net instilled in me the importance of tracking my position. As the level designs get more complex, relying less on my memory meant giving up precious charm slots, making even navigation a consideration of your build.

The intangible sense of discovery keeps you moving forward in Hollow Knight. As each new ability opened up the world and new exploration options, I couldn’t wait to see how I could move faster, better, and more skillfully. By the end, I was dashing and wall-jumping through areas with an exhilarating level of speed and ability rarely seen in this genre. It’s a sharp contrast to the willful opening, broadening the Knight’s traversal toolset as the map expands.

 

A vast empire of sapient bug people exists just below the surface while a single, somber village at the top watches warrior after warrior go underground and never return. The story is told through small bits of lore, dialogue, and environmental cues, but it is rarely explicit. This story drip feed makes the scattered cutscenes and conversations hit harder and gives the cold hallways of Hallownest more personality in the end. The kingdom is home to characters with their own questlines, personalities, and missions. During your journey, you may save characters from certain death, then meet them in battle later. Sometimes the only reward for a questline is seeing how an NPC ends up, yet it doesn’t feel empty or pointless. Despite the absence of long, sustained conversations, I still felt attached to the remaining lucid bugs in Hallownest, and lived and died a little with their own successes and tragedies.

Comparing games to Dark Souls is passé at this point, but it would be an injustice to Hollow Knight to not mention it. Hollow Knight does not simply wear its From Software inspiration on its sleeve; Team Cherry understands what made Dark Souls special in a way most other Souls-likes do not. The cold, desolate air of Hallownest is replete with both the absence of danger and the overabundance of it from unexpected corners. It recalls the way it feels to toe your way through one of Dark Souls’ yet-uncharted dark pits in a pitch-perfect tone. 

Hollow Knight is deliberate in ways few games are, from its tough-love first hours all the way to the end of its long, content-packed journey. Challenging end-game bosses put every single skill I had to the test and left me with a sense of mastery. Team Cherry has been iterating on the game since its PC release last year, and it oozes a sense of self-confidence. Every mechanic is polished to a mirror sheen, and the action grows organically around your playstyle, making it feel fresh. Hollow Knight doesn’t completely reinvent the genre, but the heart that beats beneath the surface is impossible to ignore.

The Walking Dead: The Final Season – Episode 1 Review

After six years, we’re finally reaching the conclusion of Telltale’s The Walking Dead – which also means the end of our time with fan-favorite  character Clementine. Video games rarely give us the opportunity to watch a character grow up over the years, but we’ve seen Clementine go from a naïve and inexperienced little girl to a hardened and resourceful survivor. That transformation came with ups and downs that never recaptured the magic of the debut season, and the first episode of this final season is a reminder of that, with another group of survivors scavenging for food and safety amid the overflow of deadly zombies.
 
We’re back in Clementine’s shoes after spending last season controlling Javier and seeing the apocalypse through the lens of his family. The opener doesn’t really acknowledge much about that time in Clementine’s life, but gets straight into the action with Clementine finally being reunited with A.J., a child she’s tried to take care of since he lost his parents just after birth. Clementine is coming full circle, doing for A.J. what Lee did for her by teaching him the art of survival. While the parallels are overt (alongside shoehorned-in references to Lee), A.J. is the first character we’ve met who hasn’t known a life before the apocalypse. This is intriguing, as most survivors fight because they know things can be better, while A.J. merely accepts his world. The story quickly taps into certain tendencies that have developed in A.J. from living this way; he doesn’t like loud noises, he lacks empathy, and he enters every situation on high alert. That’s about the only new, intriguing thread that surfaces here.
 
The premiere episode has all the staples we’ve come to know from the series: zombie fights, a new group of survivors, and heat-of-the-moment decisions for survival. While these threads are part of the appeal of zombie-apocalypse stories, I often felt like I was just going through the motions with predictable patterns. I could see the betrayals and dangers from a mile away. At times I felt like I was walking into a trap, like when you watch a horror movie and want to yell, “Get out of there!” at oblivious characters. The dialogue options don’t even let you express reservations about these moments, causing a disconnect between the authored story and how players think Clementine should react.

 Clementine has been an interesting character, but this episode is inconsistent with her growth throughout the seasons. Zombie attacks, ally betrayals, and death are commonplace for her, so she should have her guard up. Instead, this episode ignores her years of experience in this world. She’s too trusting, and it feels dishonest to the character. So many times I thought, “Clementine would know better than this.” For instance, a big part of this installment is her forming an alliance with a new group of young survivors that have turned a large, secluded school into their safehouse. While she knows nothing about this group, she instantly joins up with them. I was disappointed that I had to get to know a new set of survivors so quickly; I wanted to get some quality time with just Clementine and AJ. At least the group is diverse, representing different races and sexualities alongside having their own having their own personality quirks and pasts to uncover. A laid-back, kindhearted musician provides a softer, more calming persona, while a closed-off, headstrong woman exemplifies the struggle that comes with living in this depressing landscape after a romantic partner dies.
 
The new season is an upgrade in visuals, looking more akin to The Walking Dead comic. Telltale has also made the interactive sequences more creative, whether it’s killing zombies or harpooning fish. You now have the option to stun, stab, or activate traps to kill zombies, while catching fish becomes a minigame about aiming and timing throwing your harpoon just right. The relationship-building still takes center stage, with you choosing between characters and having your actions affect your favorability with them. I liked that Telltale brought back decisions that let you decide between two places to visit with different characters to bond with at each, allowing you to feel like you need to sacrifice to get the payoffs you want.  
 
I’ve enjoyed Telltale’s The Walking Dead for its shocking reveals and difficult choices, but not much of that was present in the opener. This premiere does little to excite me for the rest of the season; the set-up feels too predictable and familiar. I’m interested in seeing where Clementine’s story ends and if my choices really shape the type of person A.J. becomes, but this is a weak start. Hopefully, the next episodes can provide something more unique for fans. Right now, the emotional impact is missing, the decisions aren’t hard-hitting, and the twists are easy to see coming.

The High Is Worth The Comedown

We Happy Few tells the story of a society hopped up on literal happy pills, trying to avoid anything that interrupts its collective high. Similarly, playing We Happy Few is often intoxicating, but the high is interrupted by small issues that prevent it from attaining pure bliss. Thankfully, an intriguing world full of fascinating mysteries and enjoyable missions make Compulsion Games’ dark, open-world title worth the journey down the rabbit hole.

Players explore Wellington Wells, a British archipelago devastated by the war and cut off from civilization in an alternate version of 1964. The government mandates that citizens take Joy, a hallucinogenic drug that instills an overwhelming sense of bliss in its users. Those who have rejected Joy are exiled, and those who dare enter the city noticeably sober are chased and beaten by citizens and police alike.

You control three characters, each with their own campaign, as they reject the drugs and try to escape to the mainland. Each character feels separate thanks to distinct skill trees and unique attributes; Arthur can blend in and run fast, Sally is an influential chemical genius who can craft the highest-tier concoctions and walk outside without suspicion, and Ollie is a brash brute with the ability to hit harder, carry more items in his inventory, and tinker with mechanical creations. Each character’s story is compelling, and by the time they wrapped up, I was fully invested in their individual struggles.

 

Tense stealth sequences, frantic chases, and desperate fights help the main and side missions create exciting scenarios; sneaking into the belly of the beast past tons of hostile NPCs on your way to revealing a massive conspiracy is thrilling. However, the missions are too often fetch quests, and getting a single item frequently turns into an annoying chain reaction of favors for multiple NPCs. As missions push you to retrieve items and help people from the various islands, you continually bounce between society and the outskirts; this can be problematic, since you must conform to your current area in both appearance and mental state to avoid angry mobs.

When the inevitable misstep occurs and you’re thrown into combat, fighting is a simple-yet-enjoyable experience with first-person melee combat that keeps you blocking or attacking with an eye on a stamina meter. Weapons break after steady use, but I always had a realiable supply of backups so I never felt strapped for a weapon after the initial moments. You can also upgrade weapons to augment their attacks with elements and ailments. For example, one late-game weapon I crafted was not only indestructible, but delivered stunning electrical damage and upgraded damage.

Weapons aren’t all you find. We Happy Few is a loot-fest that practically requires you to scrounge everywhere you visit. Finding a huge cache of resources never ceases to excite. However, some missions require you to have certain crafting items in your inventory to progress. On a few occasions, my progress was halted for hours as I struggled to stumble upon the object I needed. While you’re able to continue with side missions and other exploration while you scour for that item, it slams the brakes on your progress for the mission you were working on.

This issue of not being able to find essential resources carries into additional mechanics introduced in the second and third campaigns. Without spoiling anything, Sally has something at her house she needs to tend to regularly throughout the campaign. Ignoring her obligation slowly eats up inventory space until she returns home to complete her duties. Similarly, Ollie’s blood sugar drops rapidly and he must regularly take glucose injections or his stamina is dramatically cut and he hurtles insults at random passersby, inciting fights. While these are fun ideas, the execution often makes for unfun situations.

Interrupting the enjoyable flow of the missions to regularly trudge back to Sally’s residence is irritating, and I often struggled to find the necessary ingredients to craft the items needed for both Sally and Ollie. Dropping weapons to free up Sally’s shrinking inventory space, or playing through part of Ollie’s story with half stamina because I can’t find any syringes emphasizes the restrictive mechanics rather than the things the game does well.

We Happy Few also suffers from technical issues, ranging from NPCs falling through the floor to showing they lack contextual awareness by yelling at you to get out of their house when you’re not in a house. On multiple occasions, I was in the middle of a fight and an enemy got stuck torso-deep in the floor. I never encountered any game-breaking bugs, but these problems broke the immersion on multiple occasions.

While We Happy Few is dragged down by irritating missions, scarce-but-necessary resources, and technical blips from time to time, it’s a fun adventure that combines an eerie atmosphere and a gripping narrative to great effect.

A Prosaic Peak

Dauntless wears its Monster Hunter inspiration on its sleeve. This fantastical ride revolves around fighting monsters in confrontations that can last a few minutes or almost half an hour, with significant degrees of difficulty and rewards. You go out to battle a beast, then return home to craft new gear; like Monster Hunter, that entertaining loop propels you through Dauntless. Because it’s a live service, the prospect of an infinitely expanding experience distinguishes Dauntless from Capcom’s series (developer Phoenix Labs has already announced an expansion), though how that unfolds remains to be seen. Regardless of the game Dauntless eventually becomes, its current form is a welcoming banquet for a voracious new wave of monster hunters.

 

 

Dauntless’ core progression is seductive, even if the missions and maps are threadbare in terms of tasks. It’s all monster slaying, all the time. Pick a weapon and go start smashing monsters, break off some pieces, come back to down and forge new and powerful gear. Combat is fluid, simple, and accessible; I appreciate how the weapons have straightforward movesets, but also leave high skill ceilings for mastery. New players can gravitate toward easy-to-use swords and chain blades, while seasoned hunters may choose heavy-hitting (but timing-critical) weapons like the axe or war pike.

All the weapons are fun to try, but weapons like the hammer and the axe are the most enticing, as you can really feel the impact of each massive swing, leading to big staggers and broken chunks of monster bits. Each weapon is unique, but Dauntless only has a small selection of them, and the essential combinations are few and easy to learn. While this works well for onboarding new players, the lack of options dulls the experience over time.

 

Outside of weapons, armor, and consumables, you can augment your gear with cores that provide various boosts and abilities. Creating sets of gear with powerful bonuses – like the chance to deal double damage, or the ability to revive an ally with full health instead of a fraction – is incredibly satisfying. You can feel the weight of each new tier and choice as you take on behemoth after behemoth.

You can dance around the flames of giant turtles, avoid the deadly tail of a mutant beaver, and find the squishy core of a rock-ensconced foe. Whatever you’re fighting, you need to learn and adapt. Battles are more complex than simply dodging a behemoth’s standard attacks. Learning how to “boop” an enemy during certain animations and knock them down, interrupting dangerous attacks and getting a large window of opportunity, is enjoyable and allows you to take on tougher monsters with experience and skill. Later encounters task you with dodging at the disco as an immense laser bug showers the sky with beams, and fighting under a cloud of darkness as the behemoth hunts its pray unseen.

While some behemoths are recycled across difficulty tiers, various tweaks and changes to their abilities keep them interesting and fresh. One monster lays down structures that fire deadly projectiles, and hunters need to destroy and manage these electrified blasters. A later version of the same monster drops the same defenses, but they’re shielded – so you this time you need to bat their projectiles back.

The cycling of collecting, building, and customizing cycle is great all the way to the end. At that point, things change. Dauntless’ endgame offers players a new type of loot to collect, rare recipes that provide insane bonuses that break all the rules (like resurrecting after death for a few incredibly powerful vengeful blows). However, the true top end of the game is currently limited to two challenging monster encounters. Both these fights are awesome to learn and master, but after you’ve brought them both down 20 times or so, even hoping for those amazing exotic drops doesn’t provide enough incentive to hop back in for another round.

As a live service, developer Phoenix Labs could address the scarcity of content for advanced players in the future, but that possibility doesn’t excuse the missteps in the current version of the game. Dauntless is a great foundation for a rollicking monster-mashing time, but without the critical component of a compelling endgame, your journey has no satisfying destination. Only time will tell if the swirling islands around Ramsgate can provide something more.

A Fertile New Ecosystem

Another Tasty Bite That's Easier To Chew

One Of The Best Roguelikes To Date

The Ups And Downs Of Another Gripping Season

A Brutal End To A Long Journey

Since the first Banner Saga’s release in 2014, developer Stoic has strived to create an epic adventure set in a snowy world inspired by Viking mythology. In the first two games, a dark storm impressing itself upon the world forces a group of humans and giants to work together for survival. They strike out to find sanctuary and hold out against the darkness – and the army of stone soldiers its brought in its wake. Both games required players to make tough choices during the The Oregon Trail-inspired journey where a stranger on the road could be a new hero to use in battle, or a scout for bandits waiting to slit the throats of your clansmen. The third Banner Saga successfully concludes an odyssey that’s always been about holding players accountable for their choices, but the ride is still bumpy as the end of the road approaches.

Picking up immediately after the end of Banner Saga 2, this installment splits our time between two protagonists. The first group spends their time holding out in a fortress at the end of the world as enemies descend and supplies dwindle. Meanwhile, in the belly of the planet, a small group of warriors leads a suicide mission at the core of the darkness in the hope of killing it. Both sides of the tale are compelling, and you must make smart choices for survival in different ways. The fortress segments have you negotiating politics, like who will lead the kingdom assuming you survive this onslaught, and managing supplies for various factions in order to keep the peace. The suicide mission segments require you to settle petty disputes and manage the egos of your party as you undertake this dangerous task.

In a smart, topsy-turvy design decision, Banner Saga 3 upends the series’ signature counter at the top of the screen. In the previous games, this counter kept track of the days you had traveled, giving a clear sense of the breadth of your journey. Now the counter has become a countdown, tracking how long until your fortress breaks against the waves of darkness at the gate. This takes into account all the choices you’ve made throughout the series, factoring in your supplies and how many clansmen you’ve kept alive.  You’re not screwed if you’ve made poor choices throughout the series (you just have to engage in more battles), but it’s a strong feature that really makes you feel the echo of all your decisions throughout Banner Saga as a whole.

The battle system is essentially unchanged from the first two games. A new mechanic has characters earning titles to receive various stat bonuses once they hit level 11 – like Death’s Messenger making your units’ attack power stronger – but everything else is familiar. You’re still moving on a tile-based battlefield, using your units to take out the enemy opposition. Sometimes you have to accomplish a special objective, like clearing out multiple waves of enemies or attacking road blocks so the caravan can proceed its journey, but your mission is usually to clear the board of foes. I spent most of the battles wanting to barrel through them to get back to the story. The battles aren’t a chore, but they also don’t stand out next to genre siblings like Fire Emblem and XCOM. Luckily the narrative is the main drive here.

The Banner Saga 3 stays true to the series’ bleak ethos of crushing consequences for difficult choices. You don’t have as many decisions to make in this entry, since it is focused on holding you accountable for your previous actions, but the occasional choices all have devastating consequences that shape the endgame in dramatic ways, like losing a prominent character or shaping the world in certain ways. My only complaint on the narrative side of things is that the characters don’t get enough time to shine. The previous two entries were good about taking a minute so you could talk with people in your party and get to know them. The fast pace of the story in The Banner Saga 3, constantly pushing you toward the end, means that character development is often eschewed. Sometimes I’d lose a character to a bad choice and shrug my shoulders, because I felt like The Banner Saga hadn’t done the legwork to make me care for them. However, most losses, especially for the characters who have been with the caravan since the first game, are appropriately heart-rending.

As a standalone game, The Banner Saga 3 is the weakest of the bunch. As a conclusion, it does its job well, marrying beauty to melancholy and making me think long and hard about what sacrifices I was willing to make for the good of the world. Though I left my time with my caravan wishing I had been given more opportunities to get to know them better, I still felt my long trek through blood and snow was worth having, and Stoic’s somber adventure has lived up to its exhausting ambitions.

For more on Banner Saga, be sure to read our reviews for the first and second games.