Recent reviews by Latro

Hello.
My name is Steve Robbins.
You killed my brother.
Prepare to die.

It's hard to describe why this game is fun.

You play the role of a indebted blue collar laborer, doing hazardous, deadly work, exploited by a soulless corporation. Your work requires: a suit, tools, oxygen, upkeep, fuel, all of which you must purchase from the company, plunging you further into debt. The work is tedious, and one slip-up could mean a jagged bit of titanium smashing your helmet open, a careless push sending your body careening into the furnace, a badly aimed cut causing a deadly (and costly) explosion, a reactor meltdown leading to the destruction of (at best) half the ship or (at worst) blasting your body into space. Shifts are mandated to be short, and debt piles on, forcing you to prioritize your salvaging and keeping you from treating the job with the delicacy and precision it should require (though there is a free mode for a relaxing day).

Overall, your job really sucks. But as a game? It's fantastic.

The hazards and problems that plague this job make for really interesting and challenging game mechanics. What really makes it shine though is the presentation. Blackbird have done a great job with the look, feel, sound, and aesthetic, and it all comes together to create an extremely immersive simulation.

For me, that is the biggest draw for the game: immersion. It’s easy to get lost in this game, as the sound and ‘weight’ of everything feel great. Everything is presented in context, and the background environment (both visual and through the ‘lore’) keep the game grounded and contained. You can really let yourself inhabit the character in this insane job. To some degree, your imagination does the work here, and I always feel like a small part of greater story. Think of yourself as playing someone in the background of your favorite sci-fi story; the waste worker in orbit in Cowboy Bebop, a construction worker on a space station in The Expanse. The music definitely gives a ‘Firefly’ vibe, with it’s twangy relaxing guitars, but personally I love to put on my own tunes with an equalizer on that gives the effect of a radio in the helmet. Honestly, with that, it takes the immersion to another level, and I can’t say I’ve experienced something like it before in a game.

At this moment (still in very early access) content is somewhat sparse. Ship variety is a little limited, and I would like to see more tools and environments in the future. The potential for this game is huge though, and my imagination for what could be coming down the line is extremely exciting.

Some things I would like to see:

-More variety in environments and ships.
-Unexpected hazards. As of now, if you are a good worker, things go well. I would like to see more ‘dangerous’ operations where things can go wrong even if you are playing ‘by-the-book’.
-Deep-space operations. Crashed or damaged ships that can’t make it to safe harbor could hold valuable resources and unique dangers.
-Independent operations. Right now, Lynx (the main company) dominates the industry. But, I think it would be cool to be able to take on more lucrative ‘under the table’ contracts with high risks and high rewards from shady groups.
-Customization. As you purchase your gear, and stop renting from the company, it would be neat to be able to add your own flair to your tools. UI customization would be great as well, and it might be interesting to develop the 'hab', your home base.
-Optimization. As of now, the game could use some work in this regard but I’m confident as it develops this will improve. It would be nice to see more graphical options as well.

TL;DR: If you are reading this and interested in the game, you will probably love it, so just pick it up and support its development. It’s great fun now, and it will be exciting to see how it progresses, and what players will do when mod support is implemented. The developers are active and taking player feedback in to improve the game. It's very cool now, but I’m confident this will turn into a unique, albeit very niche, masterpiece.

The Way of the Samurai is found in death. Meditation on inevitable death should be performed daily. Every day when one's body and mind are at peace, one should meditate upon being ripped apart by arrows, rifles, spears and swords, being carried away by surging waves, being thrown into the midst of a great fire, being struck by lightning, being shaken to death by a great earthquake, falling from thousand-foot cliffs, dying of disease or committing seppuku at the death of one's master. And every day without fail one should consider himself as dead. This is the substance of the way of the samurai.

TL;DR: Such a great game. If you're interested at all, just buy it.

I won't go too in-depth with what the other reviewers have already covered. Amazing aesthetic, crazy fun gameplay, tons of variety. A world that is deep, but told 'in the background', somewhat like Dark Souls, through the mech descriptions, pilot backstories, weapon info, mission details, in addition to the lore unlockables. Crazy good soundtrack that I would've bought even if the game never existed.

What I do wanna stress though is how ♥♥♥♥♥♥ awesome the developers are. This game is very clearly a labor of love. All the detail they've put into it, the amazing support, consistently adding new content (like this new relaunch that added a bunch of stuff and just improved the game overall for FREE), and the fact that they are always engaging with the players. You don't often see a game that is so loved by the people that created it, and that is what makes Brigador such a brilliant game.

Please get it so Stellar Jockeys/Gausswerks can keep adding stuff and developing new games.

PS: For complaints about the controls; they've added alternate styles, but honestly, just practice with the default controls. It can be frustrating at first, but ultimately pays off.

Don't let the 'early access' tag scare you away; Nuclear Throne is well worth picking up now, and the constant updates feel more like free content packs than they do updates to a work-in-progress.

Nuclear Throne is a tough-as-hell roguelike-like in the vein of Binding of Isaac; an overhead shooter blending fast-paced challenging action with RPG elements and random levels/progression. Different characters (more still being added), randomly generated levels and random mutations as you progress make each playthrough different, and allow you to experiment with different playstyles, though there are different 'areas' that keep consistent style over the course of a few levels.

Just to give you an idea of how different each game can be/how awesome the designs are, these are the current mutants you can play as:

-Fish, who gets more ammo than the other characters, and can use his roll to dodge bullets.
-Crystal, who has more health than the others, and can become an invulnerable shield which deflects bullts.
-Eyes, who can see in the dark and can use his telekinetic powers to pull enemies toward him and push projectiles away.
-Melting, a skeleton with melted flesh hanging off, has the lowest HP, but mutates faster and can blow up corpses.
-Plant, a sentient plant that can move faster than the others, and snare enemies with his roots.
-Y.V., a weird looking illuminati pyramid with an eyeball, can shoot faster than the others, and use his ablility to shoot twice with one pull of the trigger.
-Steroids, a beefed up dude that starts with two fully loaded pistols and the ability to use both of the weapons he can carry at once.
-Robot, who can find better weapons, and recycle found items into ammo for another weapon he carries, or health.
-Chicken, a mutant chicken that starts wielding a katana and can slow down time. Chicken's other ability allows her to live a few seconds after death, and gives you a little time to go berserk, a headless chicken with a katana, hacking frantically, hoping for a health drop to bring her back from death.
-Rebel, an ex-bandit who can sacrifice her health to summon allies, and blasts in all directions when hit.
-Horror, a radioactive mutant dog(?) that can use radiation collected to launch a wave of destruction at his enemies.

The designs are creative and fun, the art is great, the music and sounds keep things frantic and intense, the gameplay is solid, and most important of all, it's incredibly fun. This is one of the best games to come out this year, and if it looks interesting to you, grab it right now.

The throne definitely exists.