Recent reviews by Spz

A great game, just to show no game, no matter how old it is and how much you like it, is safe from identity politics.

A great game.

Ignore everyone complaining about monetization. Yes, it's not worth it, but it's completely and utterly unnecessary. This is a looter shooter, like Warframe, the whole gameplay loop is farming. If you farm efficiently and play well you can get everything fairly quickly.

People seem to forget the point of the game is to play it long term, over months and years, they want everything NOW despite putting in casual effort and taking baffling decisions when comes to how they go about farming.

That aside, it's very Warframe-y with Destiny open-world and dungeons. You have several Descendants and Weapons, each unique in how they play and function, and alongside the module system you can tailor them to the way YOU want to play, create unique strategies and builds and just have fun all around.

Better than Warframe, I approve.

This is a review by someone who loves both Ogre Battle 64 and the Fire Emblem series, obvious inspirations for this game.

I'll go through everything I hope they improve for a possible sequel while compounding it with everything I think they got right and what can be improved.

Let's start with the plot. It's obvious mixing Ogre Battle 64 and Fire Emblem Three Houses. When the game started, and I saw the map showing each faction and that a rebellion was happening, I instantly knew where it was going. Add that to a prophecy, and I knew we'd fight the rebellion, join it, much like OB64, and then gain superpowers like FE:3H. I'll say I love both those types of plots, and as long as it's done competently, it never gets old. Everyone loves watching the protagonist evolve and get stronger.

I also enjoy the fact you lose and gain troops throughout the game. It gives it more variety and makes you use and rely on troops you generally wouldn't, giving you a new appreciation for them, and they did a good job at it.

I'd have dragged the part before joining the rebellion a bit longer and made the protagonist question their role and what they're fighting against more, but overall, it did its job, and I enjoyed it.

The sounds and music are pretty competent. OG64 obviously inspired the sound design. I can clearly see the similarities between the slashes, especially the Cataphract lance sounds from OG64 and the ones in Symphony of War. Given the size of the studio, it's good.

My biggest complaint regarding graphics is twofold: The cutscenes. I much prefer the 3D style from OG64 compared to the 2D Pixel Sprite, but I understand that it's the limitations of the engine used, and, given that fact, it was well done.

My other complaint is the battle sprites! They're good, but give them an idle loop while in battle! Rather than being static, have a few frames for each sprite where they're moving. It made your troops so much more alive in OG64, and it would've made the experience much better here.

As for the overworld, there are many ways they can change how it plays out in the future. It's perfectly functional as it is, but it feels a tad limiting compared to games like Fire Emblem Engage, where you have many options for interacting with it. Given it might be deliberate, since the game is more focused on the troops fighting rather than overworld shenanigans.

For the troops themselves, my biggest gripes are how limited they are compared to OG64. It needs more unique types of troops, or rare ones, like the Black Knights from OG64, where you could only upgrade a limited amount to them because you need the weapon, or the unique vampire, dragoon, and werewolf. Having unique/rare troops makes your armies have more personality.

More beasts as well! And troops that interact with them, like how the beast tamer pairs with the hellhound on OG64. Lastly, to add more strategic depth, the same system OG64 used when positioning troops on the grid is sorely lacking. The fact that a melee unit interacts the same no matter where it is will always feel weird. Having troops act differently based on whether it's in the front, mid, or back row would've made the whole army-building aspect so much more enjoyable.

Especially since you can't disrupt formations when attacking from the side or from the back.

The artifacts system and the elements influencing the stats are interesting. But they could do a bit more with it, for example, having a mage that changes its attack type based on which element he is.

The new portraits are lovely. The characters are all recognizable and well-made. I approve of this art style.

Overall, it's a great experience, a great game, and a great homage to some of my favorites of all time. I hope they change some of the things I've mentioned or head in that direction!

Easily a 9/10 on my books.

Very weak.

The game is 90% combat, every mission is combat-based and involves mowing down enemies, and there lies the problem. Not the quantity, but the quality. The combat is really bad. Your weapons have no weight, enemies don't react, there's no element of skill involved, it's just a bunch of walking sponges that you need to shoot down. It's a really basic, unfun and repetitive combat.

The same can be said for the missions, you'll always be doing the same which wouldn't be bad if, again, the combat wasn't so bad. There wasn't a single second where I was having fun when fighting the enemies in this game, and most of the game comprises of just that.

Beyond that is just your regular grind-fest, like holding a carrot in front of a donkey, very basic Skinner box design. Nothing to see here.

Context: I've seen all endings, went Charmless on my first NG+ and used exclusively Sword and Mortal Draw, except for 'Shura' Ending, where I was basically forced to use the Umbrella for the second phase of the last boss.

The game is amazing. The exploration is fast paced and the combat is brutal as expect from a Souls-like, but it's has a rhythm to it. You put on the pressure, parry the counter attacks and keep the pressure up to deal with bosses, making it extremely satisfying when you pull a good fight off even if you already beaten the boss a number of times before.

Coming from someone who loved Dark Souls and Bloodborne, this game was the most fun I've had with a FromSoftware game. It's the only one I've beaten more than once and can confidently say I own every boss.

Overall it's an almost perfect game for what it proposes to do, can't recommend it enough.

What to say about the game that hasn't been said yet. It's a game better suited for stoic gamers, used to old-school gaming. You climb, you fall, you learn.

The game has no nonsense, no bs, no randomness. It's you and your hammer. In the words of the creator himself, you don't get stronger, your hammer doesn't get longer, you just learn how to climb. Seeing the skill progression as the hours and clears pile in is an amazing sight to behold.

The controls are very simple, you just swing your mouse around. May be awkward at first, but before long it becomes an extension of your arm. It's like learning to use a new limb, at first you're just flailing around a bit, but before long your mastery over it is astonishing.

I recommend this game for people who don't get upset at fair, single-player experiences. Whenever you fall it's your fault and no one's else, if you can't get that concept through your head just step away.

In 27h I've cleared it 50 times for the achievement.

Extremely weak, mobile garbage disguised as a PC game.

Lack of customization kills the game, it's a casual experience with no real tactic behind it, a dumbfied version of the original Risk game, made for the super casual mobile market, the only enjoyment we got out of this was laughing at how stupid it was.

A great game with unique mechanics and very engaging premise, allowing each player to have a different experience even when going through the same things, you can roleplay as you see fit.

The game's downside is it's very short length and if your brain works quickly the game can be a bit too easy, making it so money isn't a concern. I ended both 'main' endings while having such an enormous surplus of money that it became a non-factor. But I assume that won't be the case for most people.

Overall a great experience, especially for the price point.

The game is pretty meh overall. Just more of the same, the lack of development time, since it's a new game, compared to something like 7 Days to Die or other similar games really show. A very standard, shallow experience with very basic combat, progression and crafting system.

It has some decent ideas to spin the usual formula, but the game is still several patches away from being interesting.

Edit: 60 hours later, I've played with friends, I've tried every facet of the game. A more in-depth review, just FYI just expanding on what I already said 6 hours into the game.

Mobility in this game is such a drag. The world is huge but your ability to move around is extremely limited, isn't easy to always have lots of stamina in this game, you just go through your food extremely quickly if you're always using it to explore, unless you REALLY go out of your way to farm for a lot of food.

This makes exploring and gathering resources such a pain in the ass, and without going into spoilers, gathering Iron and Silver is so bad. Even when you find silver is bad because dragging the cart with loot around in mountains and uneven terrain is such a chore.

The combat is very basic, you can attack, parry and roll, which gives you an iframe, but besides that you only have your basic attack, which usually extends in a 3 hit-combo, or a special attack that depending on the weapon it can be good or straight up trash. 1-on-1 is a joke since you can just parry and blow the enemy up, your two biggest enemies are really the fact you can only attack straight so if the enemy is above or below you, good luck. And the fact you'll probably be sprinting around and be ambushed by enemies when you have no stamina and you might end up dying or having to kite them around until you regain some stamina.

Building can be decent depending what you wanna build, but if you're the type that loves epic huge buildings you're out of luck, the stability system in this game limits so much what you can do. For example you can only pile a few stone walls on top of each other before it starts falling apart on itself, so you're extremely limited on how high you can go vertically. Also, good luck building without flying mode because there's no ladders or anything of the sort to assist you building on high places, only flimsy stairs that are a pain to position and use.

The game has good ideas but it's really awful on it's execution in a lot of areas. Make building more forgiving on the stability, like A LOT MORE FORGIVING. Make it so your stamina regen faster when out of combat, make it easier for the cart to move around. Increase the boat's speed, make wind less of a pain in the ass when you're going against it. Remove or reduce the amount of those tiny ass mountains that waste your time and patience, make it so the Iron dungeons are actually Dungeons and not 'hit the mud simulator', just to name a few.

Sadly I can't recommend this game on it's current state. I bought it when it first came out on open beta and as a Terraria lover, Starbound showed a ton of potential.

Several years later and the game is still going nowhere. It's still nowhere near what Terraria has to offer at that point and over time Starbound just ceased to launch updates due to a console release, while Terraria kept being updated for much longer.

It's a shame to say that Terraria just outclasses Starbound in every regard, Starbound feels very empty, very game-y. Yes there are millions of planets, but they're all the same. Might as well just be a planet of each type and you won't even notice the difference.

Hoping they'll eventually keep updating the game, but after so many years my hopes are very thin. Which is a shame because it had tons of potential to be a bigger, better Terraria.