Nedávné recenze uživatele Trip Fisk

Kinda got scared from the numerous negative reviews making it sound like there's something defective about this collection.

Then Humble Bundle had both Capcom Arcade Stadiums in a bundle and I jumped for it. Both stadium 1 and 2 work and play fine on my PC so I have no idea what the negative reviews are on about.... Except the ones whining about DRM - THOSE are from communists and software pirates who hate the idea of DRM and want anything with it to fail commercially. These complaints don't even make any sense given if you wanted to play every game in this compilation (and more) without DRM and for free, you can do so with MAME. Honestly, I don't think anyone would know the DRM is there unless they tried to pirate this collection which, again, is just 'why?'

To the 1 negative review where they couldn't get the game to start: Capcom Arcade Stadium 2 uses RE Engine to fully render a mock arcade, so if you're trying to play this on a potato, that's probably why.

Outside of that, the only people I'd expect to be angry with this compilation are purists who would predictably get mad the NA ROMs aren't 100% original using the Japanese titles likely due to stupid copyright/potential political reasons:

Hissatsu Buraiken = Avengers

Ganu Sumoku = Gun.smoke (this better be because of the ancient TV show and not idiotic political takes on the word 'gun'. And yes, its called gun.smoke. The . between gun and smoke is the most important letter of them all)

That being said, I'd also expect anger over most of the games from Capcom Arcade Cabinet being recycled for this collection. Although, to be fair, the ROMs in Arcade Cabinet were tampered with and their behavior wasn't 100% arcade accurate. Stadium's ROMs seem to be 1:1 arcade perfect, although some games have been censored/edited.

This collection includes lots of features I don't care about to emulate the arcade experience: scan lines, filters, CRT deformation and the like. Who cares? I like the rewind feature though.

The selection of games in this collection is a bit of a mix of good, bad, and obscure. I'll list the Capcom arcade generations and call out some of the better games:

- There are lots of pre-CPS board Capcom games here. Capcom knew how to make games at this time, but not how to make them good or enjoyable. This time period is from Capcom's inception up to 1988. Most of these games were also in the Capcom Arcade Cabinet collection, but they're mostly unmolsted for this collection. Most of them still suck, aren't fun, and are frustrating. Strangely, most NES versions of these same games are much, much better.

1943 Kai : maybe the only standout from this era that is actually pretty good

Tiger Road : another some people seem to like. I don't care for it.

- This collection also features a bunch of lesser known, obscure, and b-tier games from Capcom's CPS1 generation (1988-1995). The advent of CPS 1 in addition to suddenly knowing WTF they were doing is when Capcom made a name for itself in video game arcades where most of these games wound up being good and fun (if not also unfair to take in lots of quarters):

Magic Sword - A classic. Its hard to explain this game. Its like a D&D inspired side scroller.

The King of Dragons - Basically a mash up of Final Fight with D&D. Back in the day, I never saw this in an arcade, ever. Only on SNES.

Knights of the Round - Basically medieval Final Fight. This is perhaps my favorite Capcom game and was basically in and out of arcades in about a year never to be seen again. This is like the 4th time I've stupidly bought this game in a Capcom collection. I don't care because I like the game so much! The concept of having the Knights of the Round Table evolve as they level up where King Arthur becomes a walking suit of bronze armor that uses a giant spoon to beat up medieval fair actors just works and never gets old for me.

- The CPS2 generation (1993-2003) games found here are all lesser known/L@@K R@R3. Their rareness and obscurity is not an exaggeration. Unless it was a huge game with a known title, you wouldn't see many of these show up in an arcade. And if you did see a b-tier CPS2 game, it didn't last long. Capcom also cracked down hard on bootlegging/piracy with CPS2 to the point every board had encryption keys kept alive via a battery. When the battery ran out of power, the board would commit sudoku. The security was so robust for these games, it wasn't cracked until relatively recently by people who then dumped 100% playable ROMs to MAME. A blessing since you didn't see many of these games appear in arcades back in the day, and you likely won't see any in a vintage video arcade today.

Saturday Night Slam Masters: YES! This was another game that was literally in almost every arcade in NA when it came out, and pretty much disappeared from them all at the same time about a month later. Playing it again now, decades later, I'm reminded how the CPU AI makes this game not fun at all; its unfairly good. I'm also reminded how I was angry with the SNES version for not letting you play as Scorpion in single player.... Only to discover this was also the case for the arcade version; you can pick him in tag team match tho. And he's the only guy I wanted to play because he looks like a bad ass ninja while everyone else looks like a giant doughy drunken gweilo.

all 3 Darkstalker/Vampire Savior games : I consider these all rare. When it came to arcade fighters from Capcom, most arcade curators picked Street Fighter 2 over anything else so I only ever saw a few DS 1 and 2 cabinets in NA arcades and never saw 3 ever. Darkstalkers 1 is a shameless ripoff of Street Fighter 2 but the others are actually pretty good and unique fighters.

Super Gem Fighter Minimix : This is maybe the dumbest game ever made, but I found it so. much. fun. It looks like Street Fighter 2 for kids, but plays like something intended to be goofy and not serious in a very Japanesy way. I actually saw this in one NA arcade once, its a lot of fun.

Mega Man The Power Battle & Megaman 2 The Power Fighters: I don't believe either one of these ever found their way to arcades outside of Japan. Its kind of what you would expect for a Megaman game adapted for the arcade; its just boss fights. Its not bad. I imagine it would have done well in NA if given the chance.

All 3 Street Fighter Alphas : By the time these came out, Street Fighter 2 had played itself out so nobody was playing and NA arcade operators weren't very interested. Not much of a loss. 1 was very meh. 2 was better, but still meh. Then Capcom went overboard with Alpha 3. 3 is pretty good, but it was still a wash and hard to find in arcades.

Hyper Street Fighter 2 Anniversary : Man, I forgot this existed. So do arcades. Literally a blink and you missed it arcade release. Sadly, the arcade scene in NA was simply dying at this point. This was Capcom's last CPS2 game.

I think that's about it for this compilation.

Both Capcom Stadiums depress me greatly reminding me of a much better time in my life when arcades existed, the games were awesome, and you could have a hell of a time on a few dollars. Its not like now where if you can even find an arcade, its like 2 lame 10 year old+ driving games and a bunch of garbage redemption/ticket games. The sadness I feel deepens just entering the fake arcades the Capcom Arcade Stadiums feature. These things.... They just don't really exist IRL anymore. :C

The other sad thing is you will NEVER see Capcom put out a compilation with their games featuring licensed properties. So no Willow, Aliens Vs Predator, Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, anything Marvel, no UN Squadron/Area 88. The D&D collection is still somehow available. You are also denied the best SF game of them all: Street Fighter: The Movie. These games are the best argument for MAME since some of these games are Capcom's best from a time they 100% knew WTF they were doing.

I absolutely hate walking simulators, but the narrative for Firewatch stands out making it a intriguing interactive drama. This sets it apart from all the other walking sims which are nearly all crappy digital museum/haunted houses or low effort garbage 'games as art' creations. Things I don't and never would consider games. Firewatch is no exception; this is not a game.

However, Firewatch, at the very least, didn't feel like an insulting waste of time to me.

And to anyone who reads this and is wonders, "why did this guy review a game after 0.3 hours of play?" I've played Firewatch start to finish on console before. I decided to buy it on Steam since it went on sale for pocket change this past week.

Firewatch is worth playing through at least once. Its not that long and its offers a somewhat touching, if not slightly jaded character drama.

Lastly, because I'm retarded or some other brand of mentally ill, this game's story reminds me a lot of the Shinto myth of Okuninushi. Specifically the part where Susanoo tries to murder Okuninushi by setting a field on fire in an effort to stop Susanoo's daughter from running off with him. This is another reason why I wound up having a certain fondness for Firewatch.

TL;DR review: Painfully average metroidvania. Bloodstained tries too hard to be Castlevania Symphony of the Night and only succeeds in being fully eclipsed by SotN's shadow. Its worth picking up, but not at full price.

--------------other thoughts------------------

Bloodstained Ritual of the Night is a project by IGA, the same guy who produced the Castlevania games at Konami until he left/was fired due to Konami's leadership deciding to ditch making video games in favor of legalizing and manufacturing gambling machines.

Sadly, I would describe Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night as distressingly mid. A solid 3 out of 5. Its not bad, but its not good either.

The problem with Bloodstained Ritual of the Night is the same problem all the 2d Castlevania games after Symphony of the Night had: it tries and fails to grab hold of what Symphony of the Night did so right 26 years ago. SotN was lightning in a bottle IGA has never been able to recapture, unfortunately, and Bloodstained Ritual of the Night tries so hard.

Playing this game, its very clear that's what IGA was trying to do with Bloodstained. Level, character, and enemy designs tend to be so similar to SotN, they're not so subtle copies. However, a lot of it winds up looking and feeling generic to the point none of it stands out and mostly comes across as a Castlevania SotN ripoff. The OST, also, sounds remarkably similar to SotN's to the point it is also an unapologetic rip-off of SotN (which makes Bloodstained RotN's OST mostly quite good, BTW). It even features Alucard's original voice actor from SotN alongside quite a few not so subtle nods to SotN and Konami in general. IGA even grabbed David Hayter (Solid Snake's va) to do a voice.

Another major misstep Bloodstained makes are some design choices hinder enjoyment of the game. In SotN, as the player explored the castle, they were rewarded with better gear by being thorough. Bloodstained doesn't reward this as much. Instead, it has a crafting and shard system which encourages grinding. This tends to turn the game into a boring and needless slog farming enemies for drops. Unlike SotN, this is necessary in Bloodstained to make tougher areas more manageable since you seldom find better gear in Bloodstained, you must make it.

I'm going to end this review channeling 'le nodding man' by nodding respectfully towards IGA. His Bloodstained game might not be the greatest, and his programmers not anywhere near as talented as what he worked with at Konami, but his intentions are honorable and the way he and 505 games have handled this game are respectable. Meaning; this game was released 4 years ago mostly complete, and they've continued working on it patching bugs and are still working on the kickstarter stretch goals. In other words: they haven't abandoned the game and run off with the money! For that reason alone, I encourage buying this game.

But it's not worth full price if you ask me, though. Get it on sale.

One final thought: the whole 'lets include characters from other indie games in our indie game!' trend is obnoxious, feels like a circle jerk, and needs to be reigned in or die altogether. This game goes rather overboard with Shovel Knight. He's a basic enemy. He's a summon spell. He's a stupid armor that turns you into Shovel Knight. I've played Shovel Knight. Its ok, but definitely over rated. I don't need to see so much of that ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ retarded special needs ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ outside of his own game. If I wanted to ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ see Shovel Knight that much, I'd go play shovel knight, not Bloodstained. JFC!

♥♥♥♥ Shovel Knight.

short quick (edit: I lied) review to complete a stupid steam badge

RE4 Remake is a remake that didn't need to happen if you ask me, but takes a still ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ amazing game and mostly keeps it ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ amazing. You won't be disappointed if you buy even at full price.

3 quick points about it:

- On a technical level, RE4 Remake is incredible. Massive improvement over the original. The graphical settings available to the player are insane. The engine this game uses was designed to take full advantage of the latest and best video cards to an absurd and needless degree which is impressive as hell. Thankfully you don't need a 4090 to play the game, but having a 4090 allows you to adjust settings for crazy graphical details such as individual hairs and object destruction. In this day and age after all the advancements in video games, it takes a lot to be graphically impressive and Resident Evil 4 manages to pull that off, it looks phenomenal.

- The writing for RE4 Remake pales in comparison to the original. The designers for the original were inspired by action/horror movies and that shows in abundance with the cut scenes with character personalities, one liners, and character designs. RE4 Remake is a product of its time; in an era of lunacy where people think its healthy and normal to castrate themselves Resident Evil 4 Remake has taken the personality of Resident Evil 2005 and has similarly neutered it which ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ sucks. The change in tone is to the game's detriment. No more fun one liners like Luis pointing out the president's daughter came equipped with 'ballistics'. No more Leon smarting off at Salazar. The remake is meant to be more like a straight horror film and takes itself a little too seriously. Its not bad. Its just the original is much better and entertaining.

- Of special note: Ada Wong's voice actor sucks ass. Its a clear case of kneeling to wokeness since they didn't hire based on talent, they hired based on race since delusional racist morons somehow have dictated that fictional characters have to be voiced by an actor of the same race and no one has enough of a spine to tell them to ♥♥♥♥ off. This is the reason why Ada's new voice makes her sound like a direct descendant of Scooby Doo and/or have marbles in her mouth. This isn't the actress' fault, but Capcom's. They made the choice, and the difference is like nails on a chalk board bad compared to Ada's original voice in 2005. Although I do suspect the new actress likely used the 'hire me or else you're racist!' hustle since 1) not good at all at acting and 2) has a distracting accent which I presume is because 'well the character's Asian so she has to sound Asian!' an attitude that actually is racist.

You can tell there's some sort of shenanigans with Ada's new voice since Ada sounded PERFECTLY FINE in the RE2 Remake AND NO ONE KNEW OR HAD A PROBLEM WITH WHAT RACE THE ACTRESS WAS.

And as far as recasting because of race, you're telling me this is the best Asian actress you could find, Capcom? Really? WTF!

At least they didn't hire Yong Yea. ♥♥♥♥ that guy

- Extra criticism: Capcom kept the remake 'your knife is a piece of ♥♥♥♥ and breaks' mechanic for this game :(

Its strange to say this, but both RE4 2005 and RE 4 Remake are both worth owning since, honestly, they feel completely different. Remake is less of a remake, and more of a different take on the same premise to the point it offers a completely separate experience. Its the same, but not same enough. The formula still works; Capcom didn't try to reinvent the wheel with RE4 Remake, and it's still great in spite of its few faults.

In fact, Resident Evil 4 is such a classic that the only people who ever seemed to hate it are those who don't like it because they wanted it to be Resident Evil: a puzzle game with few bullets because spooky zombie scare me. You can still find these people spout off on the internet from time to time. "Its too actiony!" "There's too many bullets!" No ♥♥♥♥! RE4 was clearly inspired by action and horror movies! And it is one of the best games ever made.

The premise behind Xenonauts is it's a game intended for fans of the original 1994 X-Com UFO Defense. If 2012's X-Com Enemy Unknown didn't quite capture the magic of the original for you, Xenonauts was meant to scratch that itch.

Xenonauts 2 here continues the first's design philosophy and purpose. Lots of steam reviewers are dismissing it as being no different than the original or claim its the original given a fresh coat of paint... Having played Xenonauts 2 for over 50 hours myself, I can tell these are quick impressions based on visuals alone. Most of Goldhawk Interactive's efforts to make the sequel better than the original have been put into the engine aiming for a better mix of modern/up to date features while retaining a classic, familiar 1994 X-com look and feel. Their efforts may have been too effective given all the lazy negative 'its just a remake!' reviews. Remake or not, improvements over the first game are undeniable.

Honestly Xenonauts 1 & 2 reminds me a lot of Civ 1 & 2 where the sequel looks and plays better, but there's not a whole that sets the two apart making the 'same with a fresh coat of paint' opinions stick. However, the sequel is the superior version essentially being better at what the original was shooting for.

Even if Xenonauts 2 comes across as a remake to you, it is graphically superior to 1. Not a mind blowing improvement, but Xenonauts 1's pixel work looks a combination of quaint and primitive in comparison (IMHO, Xeno1 looks like crap). Also, you can rotate the camera in Xenonauts 2 during ground missions. Can't do that in Xenonauts 1! This game is a distinct improvement over the original is what I'm getting at.

At the time of this review, Xenonauts 2 is still somewhere early-mid development. What's available now is a beta: it's completely playable, but incomplete overall. So far its shaping up pretty well.

Worth picking up if you're looking to play something similar to 1994 X-Com. Also worth picking up if you liked Xenonauts 1. Again, even if #2 comes across as a remake to you, it's an improved version of the original. The negative 'its just more of the same!' reviews are stupid, that's basically the point of a sequel.

tl;dr review: Snapshot Games Inc. created the perfect engine to make an X-Com game and used it to make an imperfect, slightly buggy, somewhat unbalanced X-Com wannabe. In spite of that, it's actually pretty good. Recommended if you like X-com!

-----------non tl;dr stuff--------------

I'll say this about Phoenix Point: if Snapshot Games Inc. polished the game up a little bit by getting rid of some of the common bugs, rebalanced the game a little bit, and handled story/DLC missions a little better where they didn't feel like they all happen at once, this would be 100% be as good as 2K's X-com games.

The biggest problem Phoenix Point has is how peculiar it is. Its definitely not set up like X-com which has a distinct projectile-laser-plasma weapon tiers and monthly income. Phoenix Point is the first game where I've ever heard the term 'sidegrade' in reference to how researched weapons have a tendency to not look or be any better than your starter gear. There also isn't an income system per-se where its easy to screw yourself over having overspent resources. Story progression is also unusual where instead of having it progress point-by-point as you complete specific tasks, Phoenix Point seemingly vomits up requirements and story missions on the global map all at once. Some tasks and missions, once completed, will add and change things to the game where you can and will absolutely mess up your game if they're done too early and you will start facing enemies you simply just aren't ready for yet.

Speaking personally, I restarted the game 3 times before I got the hang of Phoenix Point's do's and don'ts. If you plan on buying the game or had trouble with it, here's a series of tips on what to do early game so it doesn't give you such a rough time (some of these are specific to DLCs):

- you want to research New Jericho weapons and replace all your basic rifles with Bulldogs ASAP. The 4 bullet burst looks like a downgrade, but the 2 shred the rifles have offer a distinct advantage over the Ares and Deimos. If you don't do this, you will quickly run into enemies with armor so high, you'll have to shoot them a billion times to even start to damage them.

- steal airships from colonies. you're encouraged to do this. your relations will take a big hit, but there are so many opportunities to make your reputation go up it winds up being not an issue.

- research trade ASAP and have 1 aircraft whose only use is to travel between colonies buying out all their salable resource. I advise stealing a Helios for this ASAP. the trade exchanges are always in your favor. example: 2 science for 10 food and 8 food for 2 science. The 2 gain in food isn't much, but it adds up when trading a lot. the only resource you'll be able to produce is food, and that facility won't be unlocked until mid to late game.

- when 'the gift' mission appears, wait until there's a day left on the count down to do it. The moment this mission is completed the behemoth flying enemy will be added to the game. this can completely ruin your game if done too early.

- after getting 'the gift' manticore, research Synedrian Sky Defense Ops and manufacture the Prometheus ASAP. this is the *BEST* anti-air weapon early in the game. you can usually hit an enemy flyer with it and wait for it to burn to death. don't be afraid to disengage if your ship is in danger of being destroyed.

- I would not recommend doing the 'an unexpected emergency' story mission. ever. it will introduce the annoying corruption mechanic and the beyond irritating bullet spongey acheron enemies will begin turning up in missions.

- shielded pandorians have a tiny right arm connected to their shields that, if destroyed, will make their shield disappear.

Once I got these things figured out, Phoenix Point got less frustrating for me. Not catching onto the armor/shred mechanic seems to be the biggest reason people nope out of this game.

So, yeah, I think this game is actually pretty good. I do recommend. I think if it got a little TLC, it could be better than 2K's X-com games. Unfortunately it appears the developers have moved on so the game is as good/bad as its going to get.

Going Medieval is clearly inspired by Rimworld, but unless the developers are able to do something to bring it to Rimworld's level or make it stand apart from it on its own, Going Medieval is ultimately going to be looked at as a wanna be Rimworld imitator.

Adding the 3rd dimension doesn't exactly bring anything positive to the table either, it adds some inconvenience and needless complication to building and accessing multistory buildings. Something that makes me realize 2d is simply the better way to go with this sort of game.

Yes, this game is in Early Access and I have spent over 10 hours playing it, but as of right now, it feels like babby's first Rimworld. From what I have in front of me so far, I don't quite think the developers have the skill or insanity to have it match Rimworld. No disrespect. The attempt is admirable, but its like learning how to fight and choosing Mike Tyson when he was in his prime as your first opponent.

I'm not saying Going Medieval is bad. What I am saying by picking 'not recommended' is the decision to make Going Medieval like Rimworld, was not the best idea. Its not near as good as what its trying to emulate. You may as well spend the extra $10-$15 for Rimworld.

If it somehow manages to suddenly get really good, my opinion will definitely change.

*******PLAYER BEWARE*****
this game has an LGBTBBQ+ tag on it for some reason. If you play it a lot, Steam will think you're gay. Because if there's anything that screams LGBTQ+ now, its D&D *facepalm*
***********************************

I don't know what it is about FTP idle clicker games, but I was kind of digging Idle Champions until I visited an official champion spotlight page and noticed a detail about who D&D is trying to appeal to now. Something I found shocking.

The owners of the 50 year old D&D legacy decided the concept of gender is outdated.

So they replaced gender with pronouns.

To them, the fictional fantasy characters who don't exist.... They need to be referred to in the 3rd person properly. Which doesn't tell you their gender at all. And is injecting bizarre and insane identity politics into your fun escapist fantasy making it miserable and not fun or escapist anymore.

I don't know if anyone is old enough to remember, but religious nut jobs believed D&D made people satanists, believe in magic, and then think the game is real and cause them to commit suicide. If you don't believe me:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfxXug5ZMdk

Back in the 80;s, some Americans actually believed D&D did that to you!

Thankfully the towers in that Tom Hanks movie were destroyed by people who worship God, so the threat of anyone else using them to fly to the great hall is now gone.

What I'm seeing here is D&D is being perverted by people who actually are as dumb, mentally ill, and suicidal are as Tom Hanks in that clip.

Dude, wtf. The pronoun thing is very wacky. Those are used when referring to someone in the 3rd person. Its not the same as having a direct conversation with someone and calling them 'sir' or 'ma'am'. It would make more sense for an unstable person to throw a temper tantrum when being mis-gendered that way. Not referring to someone with some made up crap like 'zir' is far less offensive and anger inducing than erasing thousands of years of basic human interaction where not being referred to as 'zir' suddenly became offensive within the last decade. Up until then, if it wasn't a 'he' or 'she' it was an 'it'. Zir? Ha! You're making ♥♥♥♥ up now and psychologically blackmailing people into using it by treating them like they did something wrong if they didn't.

In game, the characters are actually gendered though! Its just the whole ridiculous real world politics worming their way into D&D has completely soured my experience with this game. Especially how beyond stupid that specific cultural trend is.

The thing that sucks is they threw the Dungeon Master and Uni characters from the 80's D&D cartoon into this game which I think is actually cool.

Anyway, that's my review. Don't be an idiot and shackle yourself to another idle clicker game like me. Its a rat race that never ends and has no reward

non-tl;dr review: Definintely better than Civ 6, but too much of a mess to buy at full price. Was on sale for $10, totally worth it for that much! Not as good or polished as Endless Legend (no DLC needed), Civ 4 (with or without expansions), or Civ 5 + BNW expansion though.

---------------------tl;dr stuff------------------

I consider myself an Amplitude fan. Never thought I'd be praising a French game developer, but here we are! Endless Legend and Endless Space 2 (despite it bugs) were exceptional 4X games. Emphasis on WERE. Amplitude IS a talented game studio until Sega bought them which was a bad thing for Amplitude. The moment that happened, Endless Space 2 and Endless legend began to be watered down with lazy or just plain bad DLCs, most of which were handled by outside development studios. This made me stop being an amplitude fan and is the biggest reason I avoided buying Humankind until it went on sale for $10!

Presently, the opinions for Humankind on Steam are firmly in 'mixed' territory. Having just played a complete game of Humankind I can understand why.

Humankind is Amplitude's attempt at making Civilization using their FIDSI (except D means gold and not dust... so FIGSI?) system.

How does Humankind measure up to Civ 6? It's distinctly BETTER than Civ 6. But that has more to do with Civ 6 being positively garbage than Humankind imitating it well.

Comparing Humankind to Endless Legend, Endless Legend is a more clean, concise, and coherent attempt at a 4x game. Humankind is very disorganized by comparison. I'm convinced the reason is Sega. To me, Humankind appears to have the main game features developed separately and then sewn together to create what sometimes feels like a Frankenstein's monster; it works and functions, but is inconsistent and doesn't always make sense. The UI for instance has a typical display in the upper right showing basic information about the player's civ with inlaid buttons for armies, cities, and tech. Then in the lower left of the screen are giant round buttons for social policies, religion, and spying? stealth? gamespy? IDK, I never really used that one. As in they were separate and sloppily added in.

Then there is Humankind's habit of doing things differently and being strange. The game starts with no settlers. It's just scouts wandering around exploring. Unusual, but it works and is fun and rewarding.

Territories, just like Endless Legend, are predetermined from the start. The whole thing is claimed once built upon. But instead of cities you'll use military units to build outposts. Eventually enough influence is gained to turn the outpost into a city. Or the outpost can expand a city by being linked to it.

Also, no set civilizations. Each new era a civ enters allows them to select a new style which is really bizarre. Instead of being England,, you'll wind up Indian/French/Egyptian/English/Molvanian instead.

Humankind also does some things differently that don't quite make sense. Wonders are not a case of whomever builds them first. Instead, a civ uses influence to claim a wonder before they can build it. They can't access other wonders untli the one they claimed gets bulit. The menu for wonders is also hidden unless you know where it is.

Then there's the stuff Humankind doesn't get right at all. The biggest problem this game has is combat. Its modified from Endless Legend's system to take place directly on the map. This can result in problems where terrain somehow allows access for the enemy to hit you but you can't get at them. Units also start too near each other so whomever goes first has a huge advantage. Sieging a city is stupid and pointless. If you siege a city, the AI responds by attacking immediately and has an incredible advantage due to city defenses and hitting first. I don't know why they changed this from Endless Legend where garrisoned units were stuck until the sieging army decides to attack. I can see combat being the main reason why people don't like Humankind. It can be extremely frustrating to do it manually and it feels like the AI cheats. Picking 'instant resolution' is usually the better option.

BTW, military is the biggest method Humankind uses to balance its gameplay. Armies are expensive to maintain and units cost city pop to build. The costs can get stupid and its very possible to completely drain a city making an army of 8 riflemen.

Speaking of balance, that's another thing Humankind struggles with. Being too much like Endless Legend, grabbing as much land and as many resources as possible will give you an insanely unfair advantage since luxury resources stack crazy bonuses and having strategic resources allow for building modern units you will be screwed without.

Lastly, annoyingly, a game of Humankind will usually abruptly end. There are things you can do for a clear, concise victory, but typically a game will go long enough until you or another civ meet a requirement that will just end the game and victory is determined by who has the most points which is boring and extremely easy to do.

I can say a lot more about this game, but that covers most of what a new player would expect.

I've left a rating of 'recommend'. Again, I consider Humankind to be a mess and very uneven, but I did enjoy playing it.

IT IS DEFININTELY NOT WORTH PICKING UP AT FULL PRICE. $10 is a deal and worth it if you wind up hating the game and can't return it.

But I would absolutely recommend Endless Legend (with no DLCs), Civ IV (with or without BtS), and Civ V (Brave New World expansion is mandatory) over Humankind for being much better games.

In fact, I'm convinced Endless Legend is the reason why Civ 6 is so bad. Endless Legend came out around the same time as Civ 5 and was so much better it smoked Civ 5 like a cheap cigarette. 2K/Firaxis noticed, panicked, and were too stupid to realize Civ 5 wasn't doing well since it was a severely gimped game that wouldn't be fully featured and complete until its final expansion. It would explain why Civ 6 introduced an influence currency and an insipid district system where ancient peoples couldn't build a library until they spent way more time and resource to build a district meant only for science buildings. Which means the guys who set the standard at least 4 times with the Civ series decided to copy their competition, and couldn't even get that right. Embarassing.

While I'm at it, Humankind handles pollution better than Civ 6 does. You can actually DO something to reduce pollution in this game.

Tobyfox... Ugh! I can't believe this guy....

A young child stumbles into a haunted prison containing monsters. The child must solve puzzles in order to survive and escape. The prison exists to contain a satanic, creepy old monster who preys on children. Child is the 7th of 7 human souls the evil weirdo monster pervert needs to break his prison's seal, so he sics his 6 minions after them. Eventually the two have a confrontation. The dumb, undeserving child accidentally wins, escapes, and the player is rewarded with discovering the child is so stupid, they didn't even know their own name until the story's end. Someone had to tell them. Insulting.

C'mon guys. All Tobyfox did was rip off The 7th Guest.

Also;

Paper; "DUH, I GOTS TO FIND MES A HUNAM! BUT I DOS NOT KNOWS WHAT DEY LOOK LIKE!!"

you're a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ skeleton, Papyrus.... A HUMAN skeleton. WTF! You LIVE with another human skeleton, moron! Tobyfox. I can't believe this guy!

Just look at the main character, even. Their styling. It looks like Chris-chan. You even get the option to flirt with your mom. Did they even test this game before they made it? What were they thinking?