Recent reviews by Salok

I only tried the game briefly during the free week-end that the devs gave us, and while the game runs well, a couple of specific technical issues prevent me from recommending this game and playing it comfortably, and all of them are related to the Unreal Engine in some way (or rather, how the devs used it).

I will preface this review by stating that the game is already looking/running/working/playing MILES better than how it did on Early Access release, and what little I managed to play through shows great promise for the game's future, and I intend on flipping my review around should this game end up with the updates it deserves. The combat is great, responsive and has some degree of depth that is already way better than the "strong attack then shove" of the first game that was the only safe way of playing most melee weapons on the first nMRiH.

Unfortunately, the ambient and palpable jank of its predecessor is still present in some form : While I did have a slight desync problem with a door being a couple meters off its hinges on my end, some zombies behavior being very confusing and some rather silly interactions with two handed weapons and flashlights (doom 3 tape mod comes to mind, but not as bad thankfully), I have encountered a minor and major issue coming from the way the game handles keybinds.

Now, I am well aware this issue is highlighted from my french AZERTY keyboard layout, but I've seen so many unreal engine games finding ways around these issues that I can only hope Torn Banner will be able to get around as well. Minor issue being the lack of rebinding for number shortcuts. With the recent addition of the radial inventory inspired from the first game, you can bind number keys from 1 to 0 to any equipable item in your inventory. While that is the best update the game has had so far, the number buttons are hard-bound to the 1-0 number input keys, these inputs are absent from the AZERTY keyboard layout, being replaced by others, such as & for 1, é for 2, " for 3 and so forth ; making that feature simply unusable, forcing me to use the inventory each time I want to switch item.

A workaround is possible as seen in Mordhau (inspired by Torn Banner's previous hit, Chivalry, ironically enough, which also featured this) with the possibility to rebind the number keys, and also a secondary keybind option that lets the player keep the numbers display instead of the silly symbols I showed earlier (&,é,",', etc).

The other issue however is far more game-breaking and (supposedly) easily fixed that I'm surprised it hasn't been found and corrected already : Q is hard-bound to the flashlight, and nothing can be done about it, I even tried looking for the keybinds file on my PC but couldn't find them. And that is a problem because the usual WASD setup for my keyboard is switched around to ZQSD, meaning I couldn't press Q to strafe left as I would in any other game. Now this is a bigger problem than before, because ANY OTHER KEYBIND LAYOUT THAT WANT TO USE Q FOR SOMETHING ELSE IS STUCK WITH IT BEING THE FLASHLIGHT KEY.

Now I'm no expert in UE, but I've seen plenty of niche indie games (even Chiv 1) have a more reliable keybinding system, and that still being in there is just really confusing (also, changing tab menus being hard-bound to Q-E is a minor gripe I have, Torn Banner, pls fix). Hell, I half expected to have more problem running the game through Proton but everything's running butter smooth ! (as long as DLSS is enabled, but that's UE5 for ya).

TL;DR : Potentially amazing game, still rough around the edges, currently held back by basic technical difficulties, but the current Early Access improvement shows a lot of promise.

So far (only played through the first game), this remaster did both amaze and disappoint me on seemingly equal measure.

+ We finally have more languages on steam than just the default English.
+ So far, game runs butter smooth, and I didn't run into any major bug (aside from one Proton-related bug that would half my framerate on startup, restarting the game fixed it). Not having to mod the game to just run it on modern hardware is nice.
+We finally have the dynamic soundtrack on PC !
+ A visual glow-up overall, being able to switch back and forth between original and remade textures (which I don't think AI has been involved but I can't be 100% sure) is a nice touch. Character models got directly upgraded, the Soul Reaver casting light and better shadows are also neat details.

However my biggest gripe with this is that they once again ported the PS1 version when they coulda used the Dreamcast instead.
- Some languages have awkward line timing, which leaves the characters completely silent for a couple seconds at times.
- Render distance is abysmal, can't see more than 15 meters away in some areas. Why on earth is this still happening when the recommended RAM is 16 GBs !? That's enough to have THE ENTIRETY OF BOTH GAMES' INSTALL FOLDERS LOADED IN RAM !? WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU ?!
- Some environment are not looking any better (a few even worse) despite the higher resolution. Doesn't seem visual effects have any changes either.
- Jumping / falling physics in some places feel WEIRD, like the game is suddenly running faster for no reason, unsure if this is normal behaviour, but sometimes, if you do a running jump or jump off a climbable wall, Raziel seem to zoom absurdly fast toward the ground.
- Despite their best efforts, some textures that are meant to stand out from the rest end up blending in with the surrounding environment (in a similar fashion to how Halo CE's MCC textures end up breaking some levels' visual design - never as bad as MCC mind you, but still making the game harder to read visually in places).
- PS1 port means awful sound quality, especially for the soundtrack. Something that also could have used a touch-up, or at the very least just taking the Dreamcast version of.

So far, the Dreamcast still wins in the sound department, but everything else seems to be running and looking better than the original PC port, I'd say they're on something of a similar playing field as it is. But since both games are bundled together, I'll wait until I'm done with Soul Reaver 2 to see whether or not I flip my recommendation around.

I'm not asking for much out of SR2's remaster, all I want is for the game to run better than the PS2 version, hell I'll even take better performances than the old PC version on all the dogwater PCs I ran it on way back then. HOWEVER I'm not gonna be forgiving any downgrades and oddities I run into on that second episode.

UPDATE : I played through the second game, and I was sorely disappointed by how insignificant the texture upgrades were in comparison to the first game, not mentionning how most (if not all) the murals were left untouched, same as pretty much all visual effects. But the most baffling for me was some small but definitely noticeable gaps in the world models, letting me peer into the void. Sure, all 3D models aside from the environment are much better now (especially Raziel, Kain and Ariel) ... but only for the most part (I'm looking at you, Moebius, your clipping shoulderpads, cloth textured statue, and borked "ghost" model layering in particular). It also has no work done on the audio, some sounds' stereo seem to be messed up for some reason (mostly guard callouts from what I experienced) and gliding in some areas was making Raziel jittery for no apparent reason. OH and I almost forgot to mention the horrid slop job that is the opening cutscene : frame smoothing and upscaling artifact and some random slomo/fast forward on top of inconsistent framerate smoothness made it a pain to look at (but at the very least, it seems more likely no AI was involved, so kudos for that). I also had a weird quirk where Raziel would sometime do a smaller high jump ... Otherwise the combat is still as messy as before, and best skipped whenever possible.

And a confusing lack of change for me was keeping both games visuals so disconnected despite the first's ending and the second's opening cutscene supposed to happen in the same place. No time travel shenanigans can explain these as they hadn't happened yet. At least giving us an option to choose between the SR1 and SR2 design for these rooms could have been nice ... Or ANY options for that matter ...

If all you care for is the first game's visual upgrade over the PS1 version and/or not having to mod it to make it remotely playable, go for it. Not everything else is worthless in this package, but don't expect much out of the Soul Reaver 2 improvements. The modding community doesn't have much for this yet unfortunately, (although if it comes down to it, I might get the determination to try modding in the Dreamcast audio for SR1) but I'd suggest keeping an eye out for it, just in case (was hoping there'd be less AI slop and reshades on the Nexus but here we are ...).

All in all, the games are still good, this remaster isn't all that great. Could be worth grabbing at a discount if you don't already have both original games on Steam.

A very sweet and somewhat short puzzle game focusing on exploration and translation inspired by the Tower of Babel, which reminded me of how I learned english myself when outside of classes : finding context clues and similarities to figure things out as I went on. A really good story although fairly basic but with some depth and a fairly strong and heartfelt message, along with some very gorgeous visuals and music. Only issues I have with the game would be some areas are very back-tracking heavy as well as abit labyrinthine at times, and some puzzles I had to brute-force a little bit, and some areas I had to go through a couple times to make sure I didn't miss out on anything.

Oh and let's not forget these absolutely bonkers EULA terms saying Focus can and will just take your personal info if you even dare to install this game. ♥♥♥♥ right off with that.

If you can look past some of the jank that game still has from its time in early access, it's a solid factory builder and one of my all time favorite games on Steam. I salute whoever decided to give this game such an enjoyable movement system.

The game and its PC port aged like milk, but I'll be damned the nostalgia is strong in this one !

Only buy if you're not afraid to go digging into config files and installing an unofficial patch.

Even though I myself wish this DLC was easier, this is a LATE GAME DLC ONLY ACCESSIBLE AFTER DEFEATING ONE OF THE HARDEST BOSSES IN THE ENTIRE GAME, and as such, anyone expecting anything other than late game content and difficulty in this are leaving me quite flummoxed.

And the only reason I wished the DLC was easier is because the only character I have to play through this is level 1 and has no upgraded weapons or summon as a dumb self-challenge I set for myself. Am I now paying the price by having to sneak past and / or cheese the hell out of every encounter and boss I see ? Of course. Do I get one-shot by almost all attacks because of that ? Hell yeah. But this is only my own damn fault ! I know what mess I got myself into and all I'd need to do to get out of it is level up my character and weapons ! I'm a bunch of hours in the DLC and although I haven't defeated many bosses (I'd say 5 bosses and 3 NPC invaders), I still beat them through the path of least resistance, and only one was a challenge. (as in I actually had to dodge their attacks, the others I cheesed).

This DLC is not reinventing the wheel in any way, it's just more Elden Ring with a nudge up in quality and variety. If you're fine with the difficulty spike that is after the Capital, this DLC should be just fine.

Reminder for the people that might struggle with the game, this is even more true in the DLC : JUST GO EXPLORE SOME PLACES AND LEVEL UP !

As much as I loved this game and will always keep it close to my heart (hell my profile picture is still art I got of my ingame character) everything in this game aged like an open bottle of milk. What started as an ambitious spiritual successor to Chivalry 1 turned into a pile of broken trust and dreams.

The soundscape is the closest thing to perfection you can get. The music is serviceable (although best played at lower volume or downright muted for sound clarity), the weapon and armor hit sounds are amazing and the voice acting is top notch. Arguably zero mistakes in that regard. Only regretable thing is probably a lack of variety in voicelines after a while.

Despite its flaws, I really enjoyed the character creation and had hundreds of builds, cosplays and other meme characters I would constantly swap every once in a while. And although I didn't like the Armory update (having to go through multiple menus to change an armor piece is annoying), I still appreciated the convenience of folders and being able to quickly find my various characters in the list. The customization is simply one of the best I've ever seen, and although there are some clipping and warping in some places (some of them can even be seen in the store screenshots and are in game to this day), almost no other game has that kind of fashion variety while keeping the system fairly simple. All the armor and weapon customization was a dealmaker for me until they decided to add DLCs into the game.

At first, the game only had Kickstarter exclusive items and a "supporter pack" which were fine in my opinion, and the devs (or at least one of their moderator, from memory) openly said they would "not add DLCs and work on the game until they ran out of money" in the past. Fast forward to today and the game has more money to put in DLCs for less content than the base game. 6€ for a whole armor set ? when the base 30€ game has so many more on top of everything else it has to offer ? Not only that, but the DLC items are shown in the inventory even if you didn't buy it, as a way to tease you and play a bit on the FOMO aspect. I would have not been complaining about them asking for money either if they actually updated the game in a significant way.

As fun as the new maps and updated horde mode may be, the gameplay is still this high-skill-floor, janky animation mess. I don't care how gud I should git, if an axe is clipping through my first person camera, I expect it to parry it, a weapon that swung past me shouldn't hit me anymore and stabs shouldn't be able to have a wider arc than a swing. And these are "normal game behaviour" apparently cuz the game hasn't had a balance update since 2022, and even then it was minor fixes. Doesn't help that they STILL HAVEN'T UPDATED THE BLOODY TUTORIAL.

While it's one of my most played games on Steam, it's no longer in a state I can say is worth playing anymore (unless you wanna stick to the horde mode, but not even that is safe from the rampant toxicity of the community).

Game good, devs good, big brand bad.
Another day at the office.

While I haven't played this game for too long to give a proper in-depth, not many games felt just right as soon as I started playing, and this is definitely one of them.

Whether it's the goofy, B-movie-esque writing or all the various interactions between the weapons and enemy types, it all feels JUST RIGHT.

While the intrusive anti-cheat is such a bummer, having it seemingly not influence my performance is always welcome, especially since I'm playing on Linux through Proton.

[s]Only other[/s] gripe I have with the game is the current lack of variety in voice packs for the player characters, I do understand that translating and getting regional VAs for all of these can't be easy but 2 male and 2 female feels very limited.

EDIT : as it turns out there are a couple of other issues I have with the game as we speak :
The worst offender for me is the crashes, I swear I've had a crash a third of the time at the end of each mission. The engine being the same as Darktide is showing its lack of stability.

Walking on some dead "bodies" (mostly tanks) will just melt your health away for no reason, and sometimes when killing a certain enemy, the "legs" part are still alive and still trying to kick your teeth in, despite the pilot being dead.

Last I checked, map controls were rather weird and not properly stop other actions in some cases, such as shooting with a Patriot or throwing stratagems.
The Patriot also doesn't use my keybind for melee attacks and defaults to F.

I haven't checked this one either recently, but the recoilless solo reload will always eat ammo when you press R, even during a partial reload.

As much as I don't like the monetisation being the way it is, at least you can grab "Super Credits" while on a mission.

But the current flow of updates and weapon balancing gives me high hopes for the future.

So many people on the Steam forums can't stop saying dumber ♥♥♥♥ than your usual Twitter ♥♥♥♥-fest, and even then it shouldn't be that hard identifying a political satire, yet here we are ... This game sure is great when there isn't a whiny baby in your ear telling you it's not.

BUT GUESS WHAT NONE OF THAT MATTERS BECAUSE THEY ADDED THE FINAL STRAW THAT BROKE MY PATIENCE WITH THE GAME AND THAT IS FORCING ME TO CREATE A PSN ACCOUNT TO PLAY THE GAME WHEN I PREVIOUSLY DIDNT NEED TO. AS FUN AS THE GAME IS, CHANGING EULA ON THE FLY IS NOT OKAY.

I LOVE THE SMELL OF DEMOCRACY IN THE MORNING

EDIT 2 : The game is in a very good state now, with the third enemy faction being added to the game, BUT I have to say the game STILL suffers from day one bugs (HUD showing teammates as constantly out of ammo, texture/sounds pop-in on my definitely above average PC as well as some second-long stutters when no other games gave me that problem). At least the game isn't overheating my PC and hard-crashing my system anymore so uhh yay ?

EDIT 3 : Man I don't even know how to treat the devs anymore, "free" armor that has a very strong and exclusive perk, a gun that costs almost as much as an entire pass, and the cherry on top : I got done dirty and had a cape displayed in the store that was the wrong one once I purchased it. The ONLY redeeming quality of this monetary nightmare is that you can grind your ass off for supercredits, but they're so painfully slow to get, and the game expects you to cough up so much for that FOMO ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ store ... I know my review is flip-flopping around constantly, but that's just how my view of the game keeps changing the more the devs fix/mess everything up.

Oh and dear devs, please stop hard binding new vehicles' movement to WASD,

This is a review of the game as far as the end of the first chapter goes.

First things first : don't go expecting a Souls-like or you'll be disappointed. Only thing that ressembles a souls-like in this is "muh difficulty".

Another note is that, while I don't necessarily like that trend in recent Fromsoftware games, I can't deny that the combat is much faster-paced and reflex-focused than in previous games.

The game also doesn't explain many things and expects you to figure things out and experiment for yourself. Basically, if you can get around to understanding how the stats menu of a Souls work, and understand what equipment description is telling you, you should be just fine in that regard.

With that out of the way, Armored Core is about as much fun and frustration as I expected out of a new Fromsoftware title : It's a game that teaches you the hard way that you're playing it wrong, making it all the more satisfying when you're playing it right. Yes some of the bosses are hard, there's one I've seen so far I'd almost call "♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥" even with the most absurd difficulty spike I've seen in a long time (you know the one).

Now fighting with your mech is only half the fun, the other half ? Actually building the bloody thing ! The variety of parts and weapons allow so much freedom that, while the game heavily pushes you in a specific direction at some points of the game, you're never "forced" into a specific build, it's still letting you choose your own way there.

The color, pattern and decal customization allowing you to import stuff made by other online players puts racing games to shame here, giving a lot of artistic and creative freedom to players, which I personally enjoy very much, being a devout Fashion Soul believer.

Don't worry about "getting filtered" by the first or final boss of the first chapter, it either means that the game isn't for you (mostly for the tutorial), you've got the wrong strategy, or the wrong build (chapter end boss only). If you blame the game though, (while there is some constructive criticism to be done here) you've got a fat "git gud" coming your way.