Recent reviews by Dapper Raptor

Space truck sim. Can't go wrong :)

This game is incredibly good! Lets get that out of the way...

To start with, the shooting here is insanely tight. Every gun has a unique feel and sound to it, and you have a lot of weapon archetypes to choose from - you will most likely find a couple of favourites that you will want to focus on, but even the others are enjoyable to use when you have to.

The progression systems are very nicely thought out and create a very addictive loop of "just one more run" much like popular roguelikes such as Risk of Rain and Rogue Legacy. Each run nets you souls that you spend on a permanent upgrade tree to get better, and during each run there are several upgrade systems to get more powerful as you go along.

As it stands, the only weaknesses of this game is that it needs more content. That said - its incredibly cheap, and everything that is there is incredibly fun and well made. Its in early access so hopefully the developer will expand the content library over time, but even as it stands, its an amazing game. Well worth the price of entry.

Let me start by saying I usually love games most people would call "pretentious" and "arty". I don't really need games to make sense or have a cohesive narrative or anything if they have something to say. I believe I am probably the target audience of a game like this... But this was a waste of money.

Not only is the story uninteresting, poorly delivered and just bland, the logical leaps required to unlock all the bits and pieces of it are just stupid. The game is described (by the developer on the Steam page) as "inspired by The Twilight
Zone, The X-Files, and the Black Mirror television series." and I cannot help but think that they have absolutely no understanding of what makes those sorts of shows interesting.

That all aside, the developer also hasn't disabled the default VR plugins for Unreal Engine 4, meaning that it constantly tries to run through VR despite not actually supporting it, and if you close SteamVR it closes the game. The only way to get it to work is to disconnect your VR headset and let SteamVR run with an error while you play the game.

Honestly, your money could go to far, far better games than this one.

I got this game when it first came out and enjoyed it thoroughly. However, my less patient, younger self was not able to finish one of the levels around the middle of the game.

I just went back and replayed it from start to finish in one sitting and I really enjoyed it. Its an incredible piece of interactive art.

Wow... just... wow. I knew this was going to be good. I knew it might even be great but ♥♥♥♥ - this is by far the best Half-Life game to date, and does such a wonderful job of bringing the franchise back.

Mechanically, almost everything is so incredibly well polished. I'm not a fan of shooters in VR for the most part, because I hate how floaty guns always feel. Valve fixed this by making all the guns one-handed weapons, and letting you mod them to mix it up. The shooting is VERY good, and has me wondering why more games don't do this now!

And the gravity gloves... I don't even know how to express how good they are. They alone make this game worth playing and I fully expect we will see similar style mechanics implemented in a LOT of VR titles going forward because they make even just picking up objects in the world fun.

I have a few issues with the pacing in the second and third hour, where it feels a little slow and tedious, and there's some little issues here and there, like how doors are really annoying and feel weightless (they don't ruin t he game, but sometimes you will go to walk through an open door and it will get caught on your "body" and close in front of you and that - small thing but it was annoying). I also personally feel like the second half of the game is a bit too easy, but I know Valve are introducing a lot of people to VR for the first time so that's okay.

Overall, this is easily the best longform VR experience I've ever had, and nothing even comes close. Realistically there's not an insane amount of new stuff here - its more that Valve have taken things and made them better (for instance - the gravity gloves are a tweaked version of the force grab a lot of games already have - but they are tweaked so perfectly that it almost feels like a new thing entirely). Games like Boneworks do, realistically, do a lot more in terms of moving VR forward mechanically, but this is Valve at its best, refining and revolutionising through a highly polished experience.

Oh, and if you care about this franchise, AT ALL, you need to avoid all spoilers. I don't wanna say anymore than that - but theres big spoilers for not just this game, but the franchise at large. If you can, play this ASAP.

I'm really, really torn on this one. Part of me -really- wants to recommend it, other parts -really- don't.

So first up - mechanically its a fairly standard walking simulator (not a bad thing IMO - I love the genre). It plays much like Gone Home, What Remains of Edith Finch, and especially Firewatch. In fact I feel like this game was a response to Firewatch's success. It has a lot of similarities - particularly the back and forth between your character and a secondary person you haven't met, where a relationship develops between the two as things spiral. It is VERY similar to Firewatch.

So mechanically it works fine. There is a horrid over-the-top depth-of-field effect that gave me motion sickness (I play VR and I never get motion sick - this game did it though)... so I would strongly recommend if you buy it, check the forums - there's an ini tweak you can do to disable the effect and it helps tremendously. Unfortunately the game also has a really bad headbob that cannot be disabled.

Where it gets complicated is the story itself. I don't want to spoil it for anyone but there's a LOT of stuff in here that I think needs a big warning before you buy the game. Obviously the title suggests it touches on notions of suicide - but it gets a lot more full on than it might seem, and I do think that if you are someone who is impacted by suicide, then this might be a skip for you. Likewise, if you are someone who is emotionally impacted by the concept of an adult male having a relationship with an underaged girl, you are going to probably have some issues with this also. There's points in the narrative that almost feel like the developer trying to justify someone dating and getting a 16 year old girl pregnant (I'm not sure that's what it is - but it certainly feels like it at points). Overall, there is a lot of touchy subject matter here that isn't always handled well, so its very rough around the edges. If you are sensitive to these topics at all, I'd advise caution at best, but realistically skip the game.

Beyond that - the story is interesting, and for the most part handled well, but there are definitely some awkward stages in it. The entire first hour of the game comprises of very awkward dialogue between the two characters and feels like a student's first writing project. The main character is not likeable at first, and not in a way that adds depth, just in a way that makes her feel like an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. And the character she is discussing feels like he was written too obviously in my mind, I don't really want to say more on it than that.

After the initial teething issues, and as the main threads of the story start to ramp up, their back and forth is a lot more natural and interesting, but there are several points at which the story just jumps a little too far and almost jumps the shark. It is never outright bad, but just feels like some attention was given to the wrong parts, and not to the important parts. This isn't helped by the fact that the chapters of the game just end without warning, often giving you a prompt fade to black when you are walking over to investigate something. It hurts the pacing a lot.

Finally - there are a few key plot points that straight up don't make sense. I can't go into them without spoilers, and perhaps some would discount it as "its just a game"... but there's just some revelations towards the end where you are left to just accept the plot as it is, despite the fact that it really doesn't fit with how things would play out in real life. There are discussions on the forums here going over the plot holes, and I wouldn't really advise reading them unless you want to not play the game, but just be aware that you will have to heavily suspend disbelief in a game that really tries to play a straight story for the most part.

If you are fairly thick-skinned on the mentioned issues, you don't mind some bad writing, and you enjoy games of this genre, grab this on sale. But for most people I think you could do better elsewhere. I don't regret the purchase or playing the game, its just unfortunate that more care wasn't given in some places and that the way certain subjects are presented are a little problematic without any real payoff.

Amazing town survival sim that will test your patience when you die over and over, but hey that's kind of the point!

Hero Siege is a very mediocre and derivative title that brings almost nothing new to the genre. That itself would be enough for a negative review, but the CEO of Panic Art is also a racist and sexist who has said that (in regards to his money) "every investment kills as many of these animals as possible" (by animals he was referring to people of colour and from the middle east).

DO NOT SUPPORT TRASH LIKE THIS

I'm not sure what it was about this game, but I was really uninterested for the lognest time. Then when it came out reviews mentioning it being a bit easy and suffering from some bugs really turned me off. But after all the praise it received in GOTY discussions, I was curious, so I picked it up on sale - and omfg I am annoyed I slept on this one.

Its easily one of the best games I've played in quite some time. Sure combat is a little easy, and once or twice my companions got stuck and I had to move them myself (by pushing into them) to get them to continue - but the story is so well crafted, and the gameplay segments are really very tense. It shares a lot in common with Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, which I definitely wasn't expecting.

I don't really want to say anymore, because the less you know the better - but if you enjoy well crafted stories that make you question your decisions at time, and push your emotions - then this really should be a game you play asap.

Really enjoyable on a mechanical level, and surprisingly interesting narratively. Looking forward to the DLC!