Recent reviews by Venice

the n-word is not censored

Pantsu

Fast-paced, free-form.
Several different combos and skills.
Can switch between 2 classes.
Aerial combat included.

Significantly better than it was back in CBT (Closed Beta).
Movement jitters in hubs.

There are NO social systems. No friends, no guilds, etc.
It's just people talking, asking questions, or complaining.

Instance-based missions.
Boss battles.
Different difficulties: Easy, Normal, Hard, Very Hard, Grand Chase
NPCs provide lore.
The story is lackluster. This game focuses on combat.

Colorful, fantasy, anime.
Excellent character models, animations.
Consistent and smooth textures, lighting.

All gear have the same scale of stats.
You unlock gear and skills from affinity. Bosses also drop gear, but at a stupidly low chance.
Players can allocate their stats (STR, WIS, AGI, HP, INT). Everyone has the same amount of points.
Combo-locking can become excessive and unfair.
Many skills need to be reworked, especially Great Archer's Soul. That ultimate provides way too much Action Speed.

3 modes: Capture the Flag, Conquest, Deathmatch
Except for Deathmatch, CTF and Conquest seriously need to be reworked.
CTF problems: When Fist grabs the flag, they can easily abuse their sprinting ability. This can result in a complete turnaround of the match, where the winning team suddenly loses at the end. Respawn time is way too fast at the beginning, creating a tedious game of killing each other for enough time first.
Conquest problems: The winning factor is who has the point at the end. It doesn't matter how long you maintain the point. This makes the player's efforts feel worthless until the final moment. We could be doing really good and still lose because of the winning factor.

The matchmaking for PvP is god-awful.
Yes, you can party with a player of any rank; however, the match will have to pair you up against players of similar rank.
Waiting time can become ridiculously long because of this.
You can EASILY be paired up with/against the SAME people from previous matches.
Because of how the game waits to load a new mode, you are limited to what it picks. Sometimes, it's a duplicate, forcing you to do that specific mode, instead of the one you want.
We NEED filters, such as the option to completely disable rank limitations, and being paired with players from a previous match.
PvE matchmaking is fine.

This is by far the most unrefined ranking system I've ever seen.
You rank up from promotion matches, which become available after progressing your rank through wins.
Your winning streak doesn't matter if you lose the promotion.
Losing the promotion will backtrack you by an extra match.
Losing enough will demote your rank.
It's literally designed to reward people lucky enough to maintain a winning streak, rather than your actual performance.
Please, take example from other games. For example, Overwatch's placement matches.

Overall, this game was more frustrating than fun. There are too many flaws. The combat and artstyle is amazing, so it hurts to see wasted potential.

Don't let my gameplay hours fool you, I've been there since the start of it all (2012).

Mobility: Jetpacks, sliding, falling, ability. There is no sprinting, instead movement will increase gradually from walking to running speed.
Combat: Fast-paced. Hip-fire, aim, shoot, melee, explosives.
Class: 3 abilities. 2 weapons.
Recovery/Buff: The red cross will replenish your HP when touched. It will reappear after a certain amount of time.
The max amount of bombs you may hold at once are 3. To get more, touch the purple rocket. This will reappear after a certain amount of time.
"Mega" damage is the gun. This will boost your damage/healing (if support) when touched. It will reappear after a certain amount of time.
All of these will always be in the same place.

There is some background information; however, story/writing is not the focus of this game. It's an online server-based shooter.

While some classes have obvious advantages over others, everything is skill-based (so git gud).
Rank: Rank doesn't matter. There are no benefits to being ranked higher.
Shop: Skins are purely cosmetic. Upgrades barely make any difference.

The graphics are an eyesore, even on the maximum quality. Everything looks unnatural, especially the lack of quality lighting. Overall image appears to be high-contrast, which I dislike.
Performance is much more smooth compared to the free website version. Less lag/stuttering, and higher framerate.
Optimization must be terrible for my PC to not have that smooth, butter-like experience. It's still decent at least.

6/10 The game gets very tedious depending on the community. Map variety and gameplay options are lacking.

Short, but with a big effect. This game nearly had my tears rolling in, but at the same time laughing from comedic dialogue.

The main focus here is the story; however, the player will have the ability to move around and interact with objects. Your main objective is to find stimulants toward memories to further progress into the story. After finding enough memory links, the player will be given a puzzle to complete. Within the interface of that puzzle is the minimum amount of changes you can make to complete the puzzle, and how many changes total were made across each puzzle. Do not worry, as this will not affect anything.

The story is well-written, successfully conveying different emotions: sorrow, suspense, relief...
Like the description accurately states, "two doctors traverse backwards through a dying man's memories to artificially fulfill his last wish." That wish is to go to the moon.

As much as I want to go further into detail to explain why you should buy this game, I don't want to spoil the story.

Upon launching the game, there will be no settings menu to alter the graphics, resolution, etc in any way. While these are not top of the line graphics, the art style was refreshing. It's important to note that this game was made in late 2011, so this was actually quite nice.

I have not experienced any crashes, bugs, lag, sudden fps drops, etc through my 4.6 hours of finishing this game in one go.

The soundtrack is absolutely beautiful, easily being one of the best I've heard. This does a great job on emphasizing the importance of events, and conveying emotions. It also plays a key role in the story; however, like I said, not going to spoil.

9/10 You need to buy this, unless you're not into Story Rich games of course.

As a fan of the anime, I do like the game; however, this is not worth the price, especially for those who haven't seen RWBY.

Fun at first, but quickly gets boring. Very shallow.

Counter Attacks: Each character can counter attacks depending on the situation. There will be a heads-up for this.

Melee Combat: Heavy attacks and plain strikes can be inflicted. The combos are consecutive, the same everytime.

Mobility: Jumping, dodging, and sprinting are all possible.

Ranged Combat: Aiming is automatic. The first few shots will be a plain ranged hit. When repeated enough, a special ranged attack is activated. For example, Blake will launch a crescent with an AoE that knocks back enemies. This pattern remains the same.

Ultimates: Each hero has their own ultimate which they can activate if provided enough energy.

Aura: When fully depleted, the player is vulnerable to being killed. Think of this as a regenerative shield.

Customization: The player can invest points into upgrading their passives and abilities. This is a streamlined tree.

The campaign can take around 4 hours to complete depending on what difficulty you play on.

Your objective will be repetitive, but the voice-acting and setting at least make it more bearable.

Objectives: Either protect something, or kill everything. Rarely anything unique will happen, for example, leading a time bomb away.

Even with others, the game can still become boring.

There are a few modes, but they feel the same as the campaign.

Survive, kill, protect. That's it.

The game lacks in content for its price.
DLCs also limit players from what should be free.

The game looks great with its vibrant art style.
I haven't experienced any performance or bug issues.

6/10
Only buy if you're a fan who would like to support Rooster Teeth, otherwise you will be disappointed.

For a game that's only 2 dollars, I found myself immersed in its scenery and music. Surrounded by trees, the sun casting light-pink rays, the snow falling upon my eyes; take the time to listen to the soft winds, and just think accordingly to the piano's tunes.

Gameplay

This truly is a walking simulator, so don't expect any violence whatsoever.
You'll find a few things to interact with, that mainly being notes and a speed boost.

Game Length

This game can take around 20 minutes to complete if you focus on the path to the end.

Story

At the start, you find yourself in a home. From there, you will go outside and explore as you encounter a mysterious woman who vanishes as you approach her; however, she leaves a note every time. During your pursuit, you read the notes she leaves.

Pros

- Beautiful scenery
- AMAZING soundtrack
- Great for taking screenshots
- Can help you think/relax

Cons

- Can experience low framerate even on a higher-end PC
- Invisible walls/borders (whatever you'd like to call them)

As someone who played Skyrim when it first came out, I have to say that I'm quite happy with what Bethesda has done.

Performance
It has been proven that Skyrim Special Edition actually performs much better than the old Skyrim. Users can experience higher framerate, and extremely fast loading screens.

With Skyrim Special Edition now in 64-bit, this allows for improved memory usage and advanced mods/taxing. Such as a large amount of NPCs in one area.

All of this means more mods and consistent gameplay. You might be able to use city mods which may have previously been too taxing on your PC.

Graphics/Textures
The main area where Skyrim Special Edition revamped upon is the weather and lighting. Especially with godrays, the game can occasionally look like a whole different game.

While textures were improved, the meshes weren't. However, it all still fits in nicely.

Depth of field is customizable; whether you want it on or off, subtle/noticeable, your choice.

Shadows will no longer pixelate themselves/adjust very often.

There are some subtle/unmentioned improvements to take note of:
Rain Occlusion

Rain will no longer fall through roofs.

LODs

LODs will no longer flicker etc.

Water Flow

Water will flow accordingly to its surroundings.

Torturer's Hood

The Torturer's Hood is now lootable. This is the Imperial NPC found at the beginning of the game in Helgen.

Expectations
Skyrim Special Edition does not have any new content to offer. The game itself already has a massive amount of content to deliver either way.

Cons
The only con I think of is the fact that you'll have to wait for mods/utilities from Skyrim to be ported over to Skyrim Special Edition.

Conclusion
This is a no-brainer for people who never played Skyrim. As for those who already did, you will have Skyrim Special Edition for free if you own all the DLCs. Now, if you're not in that case, then I still highly recommend buying Skyrim Special Edition if it's on sale.