Recent reviews by Empty

Very solid L4D-like, the campaign is short but designed around replayability, with missions being semi-dynamic to keep them fresh on a replay.

Guns feel great, character abilities are fun and very powerful, the game throws insane amounts of zombies at you and it's cool as hell. There is an insane variety in the arsenal, almost too many to pick from, but if you have a favourite style of gun, it's here. Fast SMGs, powerful shotguns, versatile assault rifles, they all feel great. Overall combat is great fun, teamwork is encouraged and while some elite enemies can be a bit annoying, the game is mostly a sandbox so restarting a mission doesn't feel that bad if you wipe (you just get to go kill more zombies). Horde events are the highlight of the game, it's absolutely amazing how many zombies they get on screen. Later campaign missions genuinely feel like a scene from 28 days later, it's awesome.

Vehicles are satisfying to drive and are remarkably polished, it feels great to drive vehicles, man the vehicles turrets or just sit shotgun, you can even sit on the roof at full speed! They feel at home in the level and combat design, not a tacked on afterthought, they are fantastic. Zombies grab the sides, the 50 cal punches through crowds, you can run enemies down, the winch is fun and dynamic, the physics are solid. It's great.

Don't buy this for the story or expecting a long play through, you might get hooked and do 2-3 replays, or try and clear the game on the highest difficulty which will increase your playtime. In my group of 3 we completed the campaign on hard more or less first try in about 10~ hours, but I would be extremely happy to play through the campaign again another time, so I feel like I will get replayability out of this some day.

Overall, I think 60 dollars (AUD) does feel a bit high, but the game is fantastic and absolutely a hidden gem of a coop game. I would love to see a 2nd campaign added. Come at it with the right mindset and you'll love it.

odyssey is overall a bit of a disappointment, I never wanted space legs and the space legs we got kinda suck,
however! recent updates in the last 12 months have been fantastic, new, awesome ships (fun to fly, customise, and look at), new story content (thargoid war was incredible, looking forward to whatever comes next) and the devs actually giving some love to the game (admittedly at a snails pace) make me say that odyssey no longer deserves mostly negative reviews.

elite is still elite, and if you like elite and odyssey is on sale, it's definitely worth buying to keep up with the latest mostly free content updates.

mostly i'm posting this review to try and bump the reviews up from negative because while odyssey was deeply flawed, it's still the currently developing and supported version of elite, getting this expansion for 10 bucks or less is fantastic value, just don't have unrealistic expectations and have fun going pew-pew in a spaceship in the coolest galaxy there is.

Don't believe the hype, it's not a new C&C game, if you want a C&C game, go play one of the old ones, or starcraft, or warcraft, or whatever.

It's not bad! It's just not fantastic, cutscenes feel cheap, writing and line delivery are sub par, the plot and setting are just a worse tiberium ripoff. There is no Kane, there is no scenery chewing live action cutscenes, there aren't any super memorable or unique units. The game feels like it was directed and designed by passionate C&C fans, people who really love the franchise and I'm fairly sure a chunk of them worked on the franchise, but it's not the direction that's the problem.

Overwhelmingly, this game feels cheap. Some parts are executed well, the actual gameplay is solid, but most of it feels phoned in. It feels like the leadership on the project love C&C but the game itself was built by minimum wage outsourcers who don't love the franchise at all. Unit voice acting is flat, the world-building cutscenes are soulless, they feel like they are here because old C&C had cutscenes, whereas old C&C had cutscenes cause someone had 3D software and freaking loved helicopters and explosions. Unit designs are boring and forgettable. The setting is a blatant ripoff, not a loveletter. Voice acting sucks, every mission is the same, there are rampant typos, the meta progression upgrade system is mostly uninteresting and just exists. Missions are samey and routinely things we have seen before millions of times. Cutscenes are cheap, characters wear masks to avoid animating lip sync, don't even dream of a live action cutscene.

I can't in good faith give this a thumbs down, I complain a lot, but it's solid, it plays well, it ticks the boxes of an RTS, you build a base, make an army, and blow stuff up. For old fans of the genre it's a breath of air, but it's not the revival of the genre, it's much more of a terminally ill patient getting a final burst of energy before they pass, for old fans of the genre maybe it's a glimmer of nostalgia, but I can't recommend this to someone new to RTS, play one of the classic titles, boot up SupCom, SC2, Generals, Warcraft 3, or older titles like Tiberian Sun, Brood War, Warcraft 2, Total Annihilation. I strongly do not recommend this as your first RTS as it just doesn't have the soul and passion those old games have coursing through their veins.

I want to love this game, at best I can like it and hope that they use the resources from this one to make something more novel and worthy of putting on the shelf next to the games it leans so heavily on.

It's good.
50 games, just like when you found your dad's nes in the back of the garage as a kid and played through the whole collection, no context just vibes, figuring out how each game worked and swapping cartridges on a whim.

Every game I've played so far is good (25~/50) and they are all fully fledged games that feel like they genuinely could have been individual products back in the era the collection is calling back to.

Also it's wonderful to finally buy something that says '50 games inside!' and they're actually real, good games, it's not a scam, there's no filler, it's great. Play Forever!

Played long ago, came back recently for the finale of the Thargoid war to find the game is much better in loads of ways!

New content on a seemingly consistent schedule, reduced grinds, better power system (global politics basically) and the anti-alien content I played was incredible fun and exciting.

The game is STILL incredibly grindy and slow paced so it will chew up your time, and there are still issues with the whole galaxy feeling like a bit like oatmeal where it's all the same everywhere, but the new ships are sweet, new mechanics are cool and overall the game feels like it's heading in a positive direction, if you can accept that this is basically just a sandbox to twiddle with a spaceship and get into pew pew laser space dogfights the game is still great.

Exploring the galaxy and feeling the scale of the milky way is an unparraleled experience that I haven't found in any other game and I think Elite is worth it for that alone.

UPDATE: I have now completed the game, the review was written about halfway through and I feel even stronger now, it fully delivers in every regard and is meaningfully rewarding every step of the way, I love this game. If the concept vaguely interests you, you'll love this game too.

Celeste mixed with surf maps mixed with BLAME!! a genuine masterpiece

It's gorgeous, it's fascinating and it's patient, amazing level design and every time the game gives you a new tool you think it'll suddenly get easier but the game is merely toying with you and it's going to be even harder than it was before.

Movement mechanics with depth that slowly unveils itself, the game teaches you with an invisible hand by seemingly asking the impossible of you over and over again, only for you to find none of it was impossible you just had to figure it out.

The store page only spoils the first 2 or 3 zones, there are some wonderful sections that will take you by surprise, the variety and pacing is fascinating and it's very interesting seeing how the tools you are given are recontextualised, climbing is different from descending, and horizontal platforming is another thing entirely.

New tools are unlocked as you progress, changing how you perceive and traverse the world, to complete the game you will master what's given to you because the game is unrelenting, you will never reach a point where the game stops pushing you to try harder and be better, as you gain abilities and learn how to play better the game will never stop giving you even harder obstacles to tackle.

You will complete your hardest climb yet only to gaze upon the next section and not even know how to begin, but I guarantee you that you can do it, you will do it, and it will feel incredible every time.

you can't air strafe at all, like zero air control
yes this is a deal breaker for me

Boring art, boring economy, problem solving is not fun and the core mechanic of how roads and logistics function is deeply annoying and flawed.

None of the clever simplicity of mini metro or the interesting supply chain and troubleshooting of factorio.

Most of your issues will stem from a lack of throughput, but the design of the road mechanic makes it basically impossible to add that additional throughput, it's unintuitive what is and isn't efficient in terms of road design and it also just doesn't feel like an actual system, roads have a single built in porter that moves back and forth, for which there is basically no real world analogue. It's bizarre frankly and not very interesting.

It feels like the developer built the first idea they had for a logistics system and then just didn't test it any further, it doesn't feel like they are very knowledgeable on the logistic sim genre as there are many existing games to draw inspiration from in terms of basic logistics mechanics (factorio belts, openttd trains, mini metros lines, dwarf fortress hauling etc) and yet we have honestly one of the worst systems I've seen.

It feels bad to give a thumbs down on a new game in a genre I like but this game just isn't very fun and brings basically nothing new to the table.

Cute art, good card/deck mechanics mixed with classic tactics RPG gameplay. Shockingly it's a linear experience, very similar to fire emblem, which is quite different to what we've all come to expect from card games. Every encounter is hand crafted and most fights have twists, surprises and gimmicks, stays fresh. Hard mode is exactly what it says on the tin which is nice.

Lots of customisation and depth even in the first area, I'm sure it only gets better the deeper you get. Might be a hidden gem, hoping they get more traction because clearly loads of love has gone into the gameplay mechanics and encounter design.

Also very cute art.

very fun and unique turn based tactics rpg
it is a roguelike with strong meta progression elements, so if you're not into that ymmv, however it's extremely fun and mixes base management with tactical combat and very asymmetric forces which is super unique, it runs well looks great and sounds great.