Recent reviews by Krausser

Path of Exile for people who are too tired with GGG's definition of the word "balance". It's pretty good, somewhere in the middle in terms of pacing - definitely slower than PoE, but a nascar race ahead of Grim Dawn.
Biggest thing going for it is that the game can be very comfortably played SSF - I say that with no multiplayer implemented, but it's true. Getting your gear rolling and hunting your best in slot pieces will give you a lot of fun, knowing that you achieved that one item on a great base and it felt good, and your build started rolling over enemies.

The game's slightly scuffed performance wise, mostly doesn't like certain visual effects, but overall is very stable. Think in 60h I only managed to crash twice and didn't encounter any softlocks or gamebreaking bugs. Otherwise, clearly an unfinished product - I would like to praise the game more, but it still being in EA means a lot may change with a 1.0 dropping. However the devs have something immaculate on their hands and I truly hope they follow through and we get an incredible end product.

It is, most definitely, almost undeniably, one of the games, ever.

You walk, you climb, you treat your packages like FedEx - throwing them at people, catapulting them over long distances, tripping on a tiny rock and making them tumble down a mountain.
If you ever wanted be on the other side of the package delivery industry and mistreat the cargo like a champion you are - this is the game for you.

I suppose the game also looks gorgeous and has a pretty good story. But yeah, buy it. Chug that 40kg box of concrete at whatever poor bastard decides to rob you.

Haven't left a review on a game in quite a while, but I think GTFO deserves the attention.

Starting off during the Rundown 7 free weekend I was very torn on the game. There were issues like hour long missions being unfinishable, lots of small bugs and the gunplay felt awkward compared to a lot of other shooters. However giving it another go, I can confidently say this game has a lot going for it.

It's a very pretty and well detailed game in it's own grim way, the atmosphere is absolutely unmatched, there is a big emphasis on communication, strategising and teamplay. Took me a few tries to finish B1 with the discord folks, but when it finally clicked, it was infinitely satisfying to finally see that end screen, like someone took a weight off my chest.
It's exciting, it's terrifying and the sound design absolutely helps to emphasize all of that. It's not quite up there with Hunt(it being effectively the golden standard for sound design in gaming), but it's good enough for what the game tries to accomplish. There's lots of weapons, lots of tools, everyone can find something they'll be comfortable with.
And when you think the game can't surprise you, it just does. It's also worth noting the networking is very, VERY good. There's not many games you could play with two guys from europe, an aussie and an american and not even notice a single hiccup.

For the negatives:
-mission objectives are still very janky. Game is very inconsistent with it's objective marking system and triggers for certain things. It's just something you have to get used to.
-fog.
-some weapons feel very underwhelming.
-yes, fog. it's dreadful.
-mission length is something not everyone will enjoy, and I for certain struggle to like it. They've added checkpoints with, I believe, this rundown, which is great, but you have to prepare for at least 2 hours each play session, possibly uninterrupted to not annoy other people. That assumes matchmaking through discord, and not a premade group.
-did I mention the fog?
-older rundowns being effectively removed once a new one is released. Would be nice to experience some of the old campaigns, even without the cosmetic rewards attached to them when you're ultimately done with the current one.


Overall a very strong recommend. Best played with pals.

good game if you're planning to cry yourself to sleep

Probably one of the least enjoyable early game(40 hours) experiences I've had in a game ever. Everything that involves risk early on makes you very little money and if you're unlucky and get PK'd here or there you'll likely lose all of your starting money very fast. Reasonable money makers that are considered as beginner friendly require obnoxious amounts of investment that's likely to turn into a flop if you screw up and lose your ship fit one way or another. And if you want to make money relatively safely all you're left with is mining, which realistically doesn't pay for anything(to put it into perspective, to get a better mining ship than the one you start with you need to roughly spend 50 hours straight just afking in front of rocks and sending your ship back and forth every so often to deposit the cargo.

Cannot recommend, unless you're willing to throw extra money at plex to just get credits on demand or rely on people giving you donations to make your life easier.

Not gonna lie, I've had my restraints towards this game after playing through 4 and 5, but it turns out it's a real gem of a title.

Yakuza 6: The Song of Life is a final chapter in Kiryu Kazuma's story, and a pretty good one at that. Story is centered around the themes of family and fatherhood, very similiar to Y3 and once again introducing a cast of incredibly well developed and lovable support characters while bringing some old dogs to accompany our hero on his final journey. But while I speak highly of the story, it's mostly because it's a great way to close off a certain chapter of the story, not because it holds up as a standalone Yakuza game in that regards. It's a lot more grounded in reality than 4-5 which are easily the narrative low points in the series for me, but still making you ask yourself "why?" at some key points of it.

That being said, it's not all story in Kamurocho, and this time we're being treated to our first iteration of the Dragon Engine. Obviously looks bloody fantastic and the seamlessness adds to the immersion and interactivity with the in game world, this time set in Kamurocho and Hirroshima. Combat system is a bit of a mixed bag, so is the character development(much like Kiwami 2), but it's overall better and more responsive than it initially seems after you get used to it. Sadly a lot of the harder fights end with the punch spam of the newly acquired addition to the series which is Extreme Heat Mode(better iteration of which was present in K2) which is insanely intrusive and sadly makes the game very cheesy to a certain extent. That being said, I still very much enjoyed all the bossfights, especially when you have a cast of charismatic opponents such as Someya and Joon-Gi Han.

Tl;dr - if you came here for a standalone Yakuza game to maybe enjoy the cool mafia story and have some fun with the dragon engine, you're probably better off playing Kiwami 2. If you're here for a conclusion to Kiryu's saga, there's a chance you'll very much look past the game's bad and enjoy much of what it has to offer.

One of the better Yakuza titles, ultimately carried by it's story and character development with great soundtrack and some incredible moments.
However, it is very noticeably a bastard child of the engine used for 0 and 5. It tried being way too much like 0 to it's own detriment sadly. It is however still a pretty big game in scale with a lot of fun side content, hilarious Majima Everywhere interactions and some mighty fine story that's worth your time and money(and definitely a great remake).

Yakuza 0... After playing through for nearly 100 hours, I can definitely see why this was the title that gave the series notoriety in the west that subsequently caused other game to be ported to PC over time. A grand, serious story with memorable characters all over the place, well balanced and fun combat system, wild OST and plethora of stuff to do on the side with 2 major hub areas and metric ton of sidequests and minigames.

The one downside I see with it, is if you play the series in story order, everything after playing through 0 will very likely feel not as good. The series has a very sinusoidal quality to it and tries a bit too hard at times to turn a serious story into a shock factor twist bonanza, however that's just a minor inconvenience and most definitely won't deter you from enjoying this title, even if it's the only one you plan on playing through.

Similiar to Yakuza 4, the game's story at some point just goes completely off the rails and tries to spoonfeed you exposition to make you believe what just happened is cannon facts and reality. It's nowhere near as bad as Y4's 50 plot twists though, and where the story lacks, there's an overwhelming amount of positives that save this game from the gutter Y4 was.

First off, new engine. It's what will eventually build a foundation to become Y0s and K1s engine of choice, thankfuly. It's great, the combat feels good, it looks pleasant to eye and changing the engine is what probably allowed them to completely go balls deep into expanding this title to be as stupidly big as possible.
4(5?) playable characters, all very fun and unique, 5 cities with their own substories and minigames for each of the characters, an absolute banger of a soundtrack and a well upgraded combat system that finally feels close to what I had both loved and hated about Y0.

If you're willing to look past some narrative bollocks, easily one of the better titles in the series, especially with the amount of side content easily rivaling what's available in Y0.

Very mediocre entry into the Yakuza series, still running on the clunky Y3 engine with a lot of the same issues shared between both titles. Story isn't even that great, it actually feels like it was written by an AI with no sanity checks implemented for the plot twists(whatever you expect, trust me, it's so much worse), but I guess it introduces some recurring characters into the game.

Would I recommend the game? Sure. It's a mediocre Yakuza title, but it's not a bad game. Takes a hot second to adjust yourself to the gameplay, granted it's the farthest thing from the comfy combat system in the engine used for Y0/5/K1, but it's still quite nice for what it is. Biggest gripe I have definitely is that the game is basically made of 4 character intros and a sudden ending out of the blue. It even got to the point where some midroll chapters were literally made to last 10-15 minutes(Tanimura Ch3, literally 3 cutscenes and a stroll to a quest marker).

If you're playing through the series in story order, probably not a skippable entry. If you got into the series with Y5, Y6 or Like a Dragon, I'd give it a hard pass.