Month: April 2020

Video Game Review – The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

I played the Witcher 3 several years ago on my Xbox One. I never finished the main story but I absolutely fell in love with the story and lore of the game itself. Without a doubt one of the best modern RPGs I’ve ever played. I found the Witcher after I played through several hundred hours of Skyrim. I was craving more of that open world, exploration, discovery, and lore. I quickly realized that the Witcher is much more traditional role playing game in the sense that the main character has history and lore. It wasn’t till later on, that I discovered that “The Witcher” is a series of books that began back in the 1980’s by Andrzej Sapkowski. Obviously there were other games if this was The Witcher 3, but I had never even heard of them.

I highly recommend this game to anyone who likes high fantasy or Gothic / medieval fantasy lore. Geralt is a gruff and stoic character but definitely has a charm about him. Coming off of Skyrim it took me a fat minute to begin to appreciate the raw role-playing element that this game offers. You are Geralt of Rivia. People know who he is and he has a storied past. Much of which you can uncover and learn tid bits of throughout your journey.

This is a massive game. The first time I played I petered out around the 70 to 80 hour mark when I realized there was an entire different continent to explore and do missions in. This time I easily spend over 100 hours. I took my time and played lots of side missions except for the gwent card game side quests. I found the mini game to be incredibly random and kinda unfair. Either that or I just suck at the game and never put enough time into it to learn the intricacies. The Gwent card game was so popular that it spawned it’s own spin off card game.

Completing the game felt great. The ending was one of the better build ups and subsequent climaxes of any video game I have ever played. The game is 5 years old mind you and the amount of dialogue and original non repeated speech is worthy of accolades. It’s like playing through a movie in it’s writing, voicing, and depth of choice during interactions.

Admittedly the game can become a bit of a slog, during the middle part of the game when you are on the main quest line. Simply, this world is sooooo big and there are sooooo many locations to seek and side missions to do, it is very easy to get distracted. You could probably mash through most of the story in about 40- 60 hours. If you take your time and explore and do a bunch of the side missions and extra contracts you will easily tack on another 20-40 hours. Which was not a bad thing at all. I just had two distinct play modes when I turned on the game I would either be aiming to explore and do side quests, or I would just play story missions which were generally more involved and took a bit longer to complete. Using this method I was able to complete the game in bite sized chunks, while keeping up with the sprawling story.

Bottom line, I spent so much time with these characters that I actually grew to admire them and gave a shit about thier conflict. I wanted to see it to the conclusion that I never got when I had first played through it.

There were plenty of twists and turns in the story mostly basic fare but some pretty unexpected turnouts based on your choices in dialogue and physical actions against other characters. This was one of the things that impressed me most about this game, choices mattered. There were decisions made early on in the game that had an impact on the conclusion and subsequent build up to the ending. I have never played a game that took such care to include the consequences of whatever choices were made. This was special to me and definitely made the game stand out. Even during my second play through I made some different choices during a main mission that lead to a tragically different outcome than my first play though. It just made me feel all the more that my choices actually carried weight in this world and were permanent.

Another interesting thing about this game is that it keeps the character logs in real time. As you complete and finish or fail to finish missions the game updates the character bios which are told through the words of a Bard named Dandelion who is a friend of the main character. The bestiary acts in much the same way updating and adding information about the various enemies as you defeat them and encounter new weaknesses. Little things like this just add to the atmosphere which is the Witcher world.

There honestly wasn’t much I didn’t like about this game. The RPG style of game is my favorite and it’s easy for me to get absorbed by or into a character. The characters were storied and well written. Not many parts felt cheesy beyond what you may expect from a video game. The music was adequate there were some over world themes that were pretty good, not Skyrim good, but good enough that I didn’t get annoyed after playing for over a hundred hours. This is a long game and I am genuinely curious how many people see it to it’s completion. There are parts of the game that drag on a bit and if you aren’t thorough during the main chunk of the game then the ending gets held up by a bunch of missions that tie up all of the loose ends. I didn’t have to deal with much of that and I enjoyed the ending missions without much difficulty having leveled up and acquired good gear. If you like the high fantasy genre this is definitely a great RPG, probably one of the best I have ever played. Top 5 for sure.

What really inspired my 2nd play though was the Netflix show by the same name. I ultimately wanted to read the books before I watched the show but I figured the game would give me a good time in between. I randomly found the first book in hardback at the mall. I picked it up but have yet to read it. I will definitely write a review as soon as I do.

Definitely recommend this game for anyone craving a great immersive RPG experience with great lore and characters.

As always thanks for reading and I hope this was helpful. Feel free to comment. I’ll catch you on the flip sizzle.

Video game review – Doom Eternal

The newest entry in the classic Doom franchise. The god father of the first person shooter.

To be put simply, the game is about one thing, slaughtering demons. But This newest game takes the art of slaying demons and elevates it to an art form. A ballet of death, It is fast and brutal. The graphics are sharp and clean and every stage has a very different aesthetic so nothing really looks the same from level to level. There is no reload buttons or aiming down the sights. This game encourages and even rewards aggression. If you try to hide or take pot shots at enemies you will get over run by charging monsters.

I fondly remember playing Doom 2 on original PlayStation and Doom 64 on the N64. These were the more classic doom format with the pixelated demons and 2D sprites. Those games were dark, and filled with puzzles that tasked the player with finding colored keys and using switches and platforms to get through the levels. That basic structure is still here but This new game is much more detailed and has more modern movement options like a quick dodge and jumping. The basic mechanics of just laying on the trigger are still present and battles usually don’t stop till everything in the room has been defeated. Some enemies pop up through out the level but certain areas are literal death zones where enemies just spawn till you wipe them all out. The games music ramps up with heavy metal guitars and industrial drums gaining intensity. Once this starts you will die quickly if you don’t keep moving.

The core loop of Doom: Eternal operates on a pattern of shooting enemies to kill them, using the chainsaw to make enemies spurt a shower of ammo, burning enemies to replenish armor, and performing “glory kills” which reward you with a bit of health. The frantic pace of the battles means alternating between these functions at your will, or in some type of pattern. Most enemies have weak points that you can exploit as well. This makes each battlle a literal puzzle of deciding which enemies to take out first and with what weaponry, whilst keeping track of your health and armor and ammo. You find pickups for all of the above but the best method for keeping stocked and staying alive is by using all of the various killing techniques at your disposal. All of this culminates into a delectable dance of death and mutilation. shooting, stomping, tearing, smashing, burning, slicing, and otherwise annihilating anything that moves other than yourself. The speed and grace with which Doomguy decapitates lesser demons fits his persona. He doesn’t take his time and it often times is just a show of brute strength. After you fell all of the enemies in an area you have a sense that everything was just trying to rip and claw it’s way to you and you moved through them like a hot knife through butter.

I liked the care that went into this new game, for it describes the setting and how thing got the way they were. You can find pages of lore that explain why demons attacked earth and they give a bit of backstory to the Doom guy and kinda personify him. It’s not the clearest plot line or narrative but definitely interesting to read and explore. The main character of Doom has always just been a marine in a green suit but this game gives the silent protagonist a bit of backstory. There are tons of easter-eggs from previous games and other action titles as well. There are lots of collectibles which include models of the enemies and music tracks from other popular games made by the developer, ID software. Any fan of action games or doom specifically will definitely catch them during a playthgouth.

Between slaying demons there are some light platforming puzzles and some hidden items that you actually have to explore to find. Nothing was super difficult to get through and kept the pace nicely. There were no parts of the game (other than one particular enemy) that really get you stuck. The auto map pretty much shows you everything you need to see as well as any secrets. you just have to uncover the paths to uncover them. I thought the puzzles were thoughtful and didn’t detract from the flow of the game. Also the game gives you a fast travel function at the end of any level so you can teleport around and collect stuff that you may have missed during a chaotic fight or difficult area. Definite re-playability .

There is a multiplayer online mode called “Battle mode” which pits human players against each other in a 2 v 1 style match up. one player takes the role of the Doomguy and the other two players assume the roles of Demons who can summon other lesser demons and must work together to defeat doomguy in an arena type setting. These matches are fast and chaotic. I haven’t quite gotten the gist of this mode yet, or I haven’t practiced enough to really tell if I’m doing well or not, or even helping my team mate if we are the demons. I’ve lost an equal number of rounds as I’ve won simply because one of the players probably didn’t know what was going on quite yet. Still fun regardless and I will be eager to play this mode more or see if it progresses at all. Either way the battle mode keeps the same feel and frantic pace as the campaign action. It’s a nice break from the single player level type campaign.

This game has a lot of satanic and demonic imagery. People who are sensitive to this stuff may not like the environments and enemies, or even subject matter. However Doom is an unflinching action game from beginning to end. I highly recommend it to anyone who fancies a trip to hell to slaughter the minions of evil. A great game to mash through during quarantine. A classic game design in a modern format. A definite must play if you consider yourself even a casual gamer or fan of first person shooters.