Recent reviews by NICOLAE GUTA 💸💸💸

If you liked the past EBFs, definitely play this one - same old, but new(er) jokes, and even more improved combat.

If you're into JRPGs, I suggest you give this a shot - you might like it, though I also think you should start with EBF3 especially since that's free, and is a good intro to what EBF3+ is.

I guess it's a way to pass some time during class or something. It's your run of the mill BTD game, with a bit of base building added in.

Only complaint is that late game gets pretty repetitive as the only thing you can other than claim farms/events is do 20+ round levels for every. single. tile.

I'll start things off by saying that I've been playing this game on and off for the past few years. I've racked up like 250 hours on Steam, and probably more on mobile during classes.

Anyway, I'll follow the generic Pros/Cons structure for the most part.


Great concept for a game- on paper, an online social deception game is an amazing idea.


I'll elaborate on that. Social deception games are always fun, don't get me wrong- but it takes actual practice and skill to do it in real life, something most people lack. And that's where ToS comes in where others have failed: it fulfills that need of lying, that need of proving others right.

This type of game is also something that you can only play with other people obviously- which makes the fact that it's on steam all the better.

Decent execution - regarding the idea above

There are a plethora of ways one could go wrong when porting a game to the computer. However, that number is almost null when it comes to possible improvements. As an example, you can make one faction better than the other by sheer numbers; or you can break the voting by not requiring a majority, and so on, whilst there really isn't any room for comfort to making the game better.

And yet, they still managed to do it. They made it so every single person has something special about their role, instead of just being a random citizen which is nothing but one vote. They added last wills/death notes, which I find an incredible addition to the game as it makes it even more immersive, and allows town to have info on demand in the case of last wills, while death notes allow evils to reveal certain things they have found without disclosing themselves and their role.

This all enables everyone in a game to have fun. If not for this, people would've had to resort to afk'ing until they need to vote, which is just dull.


The community - I'm referring to the majority, so don't get offended if you're one of those that play for fun and aren't toxic/don't troll

It's pretty clear that you can't not try your best to win in this kind of game. Sure you can have fun while losing; but that's not the point. It's virtually impossible to play without trying your damnedest unless you want to get banned for throwing.

Custom games are one of the few escapes from this sweatfest; good luck finding a group though. It takes a long time just to find people who do customs on a regular basis, let alone manage to organize a game AND find a list that everyone wants to put in action.

It doesn't help that people look for new ways to troll. I understand being completely burnt out from this game- it gets bland after 100h+, but for the love of god, don't destroy the fun that others are having. Just leave the game respectfully and don't ruin it for the remainder of the players.

Finally, how is it fun to gamethrow? Yeah, what a way to entertain yourself. You claim Jailor while Vet and ask for TP/LO then kill half the town. Yay. Or you start randomly spewing out racist slurs. And so on; just grow up please.

Moderation - not as much of an issue but still annoying every so often

Like the subtitle stated, every so often there's a month when it feels like the game is being raided by bots, or trolls. I can't give a concrete example now, but old players will know what I'm talking about.

Those 'raids' mostly consisted of games that were destroyed by bots/players in different ways, including:

- 10/15 people are bots that leave d1

- they claim a random role that makes no sense and wait to die

- they spam chat with random insults, slurs, etc

Yeah, I know the Devs are doing all they can. I get it.

That doesn't change the fact that it still feels like it's way off the mark. The reporting system takes an eternity to work. You need two reports for whatever reason to get someone in the Trial System- and don't even get me started on it. It tries to do its job, but it's overwhelmed to the point that it takes a few months for an obvious gamethrower, or someone just spamming slurs to get banned. And they do get banned, unlike other offenses; cheating/claiming to cheat to point a few. I have friends who have cheated and have been reported and yet they haven't gotten banned.


It's an amazing game, don't get me wrong. But if you want to play, you should reconsider it whilst keeping the following things in mind:

- are you able to ignore insults properly?

- are you able to stay calm despite people throwing left and right?

- do you have what it takes to lie/persuade others into voting with you?

If all the previous questions can be confidently answered with a yes, then by all means, have fun. Otherwise take caution as this game isn't for everyone.

I don't really get it why so many people are into this game...
Yeah, I get it, it's made by Valve.
Pros:

• Animated graphics, look cool
  
• Has pretty good mechanics, physics aren't bugged like a lot of other games
  
• Has a pretty huge market(not like CS:GO, but close)
  Cons:
  
• This game is too P2W(Pay2Win). Like Trove, you can get good stuff, like Strange stuff in 2 ways:
  1)Investing money, the usual microtransactions Valve includes
  2)Investing 1k+ hours(if you want good builds for a couple of classes0.
  
• Tell me, why is there a thing where if you invest money in TF2 you get premium which means more inventory space, and if you don't you have a small inventory? Why don't you make it like CS:GO's: infinite space, or at least more. 50 slots for an almost completely P2W game isn't close to enough.
  
• Also why is there a thing where you gotta pay for competitive? Yeah, you can also just use your phone and get I don't know what, but still why? If people don't have a phone, or can't use one, you just force them to pay 10$/20$(whatever it was)? It's not fair.
  
• And finally, why so many microtransactions in this game? You want skins? Pay them $$$. You want weapons? Pay them $$$. You want to play a god dang MvM? Pay them $$$.
  Overall, just too P2W for my taste. Volvo, pls fix. Enjoyable without microtransactions.
  5/10.

Pros:

• One of the best(if not the best) plague simulation game out there.
  
• Challenging
  
• Fun with Custom Scenarios
  
• Well worth the price
  
• Little to no microtransactions
  
• Can we played on your own, or even for more fun with a friend
  Cons:
  
• Can be quite annoying to get some achievements(e.g Shadow Plague on Normal, Brutal & Mega Brutal Mode + on Pirate Plague & Volcanic Ash Scenarios)
  TL:DR; Almost perfect game. Almost. Could be tweaked here and there; maybe buff/nerf symtoms to change the current META(Rash, Sweating, Skin Lesions etc.). 9.5/10

~~OLD REVIEW, TAKE IT WITH A GRAIN OF SALT~~
It's a good game, with pros and cons.
Pros:

• Good AntiCheat(RIP MLG AC), unlike VAC -_-
  
• There are lots of weapons to get
  
• Kinda RPG like XP system
  
• Pretty big maps if you like exploring, small if you like PvP.
  
• HUGE market
  
• Can easily hop in a game
  
• Battle Royale is basically free H1Z1: KotK.
  
• Fun with friends.
  Cons:
  
• A teensy weensy bit Pay2Win(skins are VERY VERY VERY rare to find; expensive to buy with GC)
  
• WAY too buggy(getting randomly disconnected; killed while connecting; couldn't connect; kicked for being suspicious etc)
  
• ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ just WHY? If you are a begginer at this game you CAN NOT get good items. In every good zone(like Clearwater) there are freaking Snipers. I understand the weapon and that people use it, but c'mon. Not every city.
  
• WHY ARE THERE SO FEW SERVERS? ~ 20 servers for begginers? There are kinda lots of player on this game, most of them starters, not veterans. Also most players play on begginer servers. Without lots of servers, the ones there would be almost full... I mean it's a lot. You can't really find a server with < 30 players. And that is a lot. Even for a big map. Most would just camp in cities so RIP cities.
  
• Last but not least, please tell me, WHY IN THE ACTUAL MOTHER OF CHRIST IS THERE A RULE WHERE YOU CAN'T PLAY ANYTHING OTHER THAN BEGGINER IF YOU DON'T HAVE x+ HOURS?

TL:DR; It's a good game with lots of potential, even good right now, but not the best. I give it a 7/10, but will gladly up that if more servers were added/the hour rule was removed/connection bugs were solved.

Edit(like 3 years later)- was heavily biased when I wrote this. The game is pretty mediocre in hindsight, so yeah.

Ah.. CSGO.... one of the most renowned games in the past decade. What brought me here you may ask? Friends, of course. I'll get started with my review instead of rambling on and on though.

A simple pro/cons format should do as long as I provide an ending statement I think.


- Extremely popular. You go on twitch? Top streams is CSGO. Youtube? Plenty of videos to watch. As long as you haven't been living under a rock you must have heard of this game.

I consider popularity a plus as more players mean shorter queue times, more tightly-knit community(not applicable in this case but still), and overall a larger variety of modes to play made by the community, for the community.

- Easy to pick up, hard to master. Also known as a high skill curve.

This is the main reason CSGO is the game it is. Without such a skill curve people wouldn't be able to invest this much time into the game. Without such a high skill curve the ranking system wouldn't make people tryhard their way up the ranks. And so on; most of the things today can be attributed to this.

In the beginning, casual players are able to have lots of fun just from shooting other new players. This is what draws new people in- it's in a way addictive.

Following that, the high skill cap comes in clutch- the low skill start drew them in in the first place, whilst the ceiling makes them remain faithful to this game for a long time- usually until burnout kicks in.

As everyone is well aware it takes a loooooooong time to attain such a skill level that you're able to properly say 'No one can beat me'. And say, you were the best in the world- even with all those hours you poured into the game, you still wouldn't be able to say 'I did everything I could'. A 5 seconds google check could land you with new and updated gamemodes.

- Fun to play(with friends)

Now this may be slightly biased, as some people like to play this solo; and it's also really subjective, but I believe that everyone who has ever played this game can proudly say that this game is a blast to play provided you have a few friends. It's why people can rack up so many hours ingame without even noticing. It's also why I have 1.4k hours in game as well, and I'm aware that it's baby numbers compared to others'.

You also have a plethora of options, something that not all games are able to provide. Sure it's all still a rooty tooty point and shooty type of game at the end of the day, but that doesn't prohibit people from getting creative. Zombie servers, surf servers, or plain competitive are all viable options. Again, it's not such an unseen before thing to spend a few hundred hours playing competitive with your close friends. Regardless if you win you still had lots of fun. I know for a fact that I'm hated to oblivion for playing negev- but do I care? Take a guess.


- Addictive - way too easy to sink your days into it

Sometimes a game being addictive is a good thing. It can mean that the game is just that good.

Other times it means that the game employs some horrible business methods to draw people in, this being the case usually with mobile games.

Now, you may ask what the case is with CS:GO?

It's up to the player. I'm of the opinion that it's slightly both, because the game is oddly satisfying to play, but at the same time... skins.

- Huge market - hear me out before killing me

Okay, so as everyone here is well aware, this game has an enormous skin market.

Of course it has its advantages. First, there is a number of players who are attracted to trading and this game manages to cater to their preferences this way. This also means that players are able to have a bit of fun via pixels, which in today's day and age is weirdly enough something to flex with.

At the same time, it's not all in pink. A big market for anything means there have to be suppliers. Problem is, Steam isn't by any means a great platform for trading, resulting in trading being done via other websites, and that's where the problem comes in. Sure there are plenty of legit websites, but who knows how many shady/scammy websites there are? Every single day there's a ton of advertising done on the steam forums for scamsites, and don't even get me started on gambling.

It's true that not all the blame lies on Valve. They can't make sure all the stupid people stay off the scam websites, whilst also maintaining an actual economy. You can't fix stupidity.

At the same time, you can take steps to reduce it. I blame them for not encouraging actual in-steam trading. At this point it's probably too late, but for a future game I definitely suggest taking some measures to persuade people into using their platform.


Moderation - Some may argue that this is, in fact, a plus that Valve isn't looking for us to step on the wrong foot day and night, I disagree.

There is quite obviously no moderation being done mid-game. Yeah, sure, VAC/OW/others do the job well enough when it comes to hackers- I'm not going to complain about them.

What I am going to complain about however is the lack of moderation for chats. I understand not being able to take care of voice chat- it's impossible. But why are there no rules set in place for text chat? People are toxic just for the sake of feeding their ego. It's something common in competitive games, but why is there nothing done about it? There even are buttons for reporting abusive chat, but what do they do? They make you feel good. That's it.

In my humble opinion there definitely should be at least basic rules of conduct that specify what you can and can't do in chat. Banning for toxic chatting is definitely too much; we don't want CSGO to follow League's path, but at the same time seeing 'ez' being spammed every competitive game doesn't leave a good impression. All I am asking for is for Voice/Text chat to be added to Overwatch, and make it so the reviewer is able to issue a chat restriction. It's simple enough, and doesn't change anything besides make OW'ers look for more than hacking/trolling.

Toxicity- follow-up to the first point

It's a competitive game. Of course there's going to be toxicity. People should grow some thicker skin as well.

But this has gone on for far too long, it feels almost as if Valve condones this kind of behaviour. You join a competitive? People flaming you and saying ez. Casuals/DMs/any other kind of casual game? People flaming you for being good. Any other gamemode? Flaming.

I don't care if someone calls me trash at the game; I'm sick of seeing it be so common though. You can't escape it. Valve needs to do something to make the community more enjoyable. At the moment it's what is dragging the game down the most. I want it to be changed for the sake of the game; I don't want this to die just because some people cry and rage quit.


I find CSGO to be one of those iconic games that 'plagued'(in a good way) this decade. I want it to stay strong in the new decade as well. On the same note, I want my childhood to still be a thing in 2020, 2021, and so forth.

But it's not going to be the same if it doesn't change. Sure the game is fun by itself, but that fun is usually ruined by toxicity. Toxicity invokes more toxicity. It's a cycle that has to be forcibly ruptured.

Anyway, that's it. Overall, it's an iconic game for good reasons, but in the future I, as a fellow player, want it to change for the better.


2024 EDIT: CS2 replaced CSGO. genuinely pathetic that it's a replacement and kept the old reviews instead of being its own thing. on top of that, the old CSGO beta is so finnicky that it's nigh unplayable.

~~OLD REVIEW TO BE UPDATED, TAKE IT WITH A GRAIN OF SALT~~
I recommend this game for a lot of reasons, although it has a kind of lot of cons.
Pros

• It has an easy to use interface(inventory, crafting etc)
  
• It has lots of content, from simple survival against zombies with guns to expensive metal houses and planes, from simple to mega zombies, from simply avoiding to fight to just going in.
  
• It can be very entertaining, even with its frustration.
  
• With a team, even of one, you can easily kill the players on a server if you both are really good at the game(even me alone can kill a team of three, although I usually get sniped soon after).
  
• On a server with a nice community, you can meet new people, communicate with them, team with them or kill them, be friends or enemies with someone, possibilities are almost limitless.

Cons

• It's hard to find a server with a good ping if you are not in the UK, Russia, US, or Turkey. For me in Romania it's hard to find a server with good, stabile ping, and even harder if I want it with a nice community.
  
• It's frustrating at the beggining to get items to survive, especially on Normal/against players. There will always be players that will KOS you even if you have nothing on you, or you have just some melee weapon. And there are still the zombies that make you bleed on normal mode. It's just that it takes a lot to get the items to be able to survive, as you have to sneak a lot, crouch for zombies and prone for players.
  
• Of course there are advantages for players who bought Gold, but seriously, they can make their skin so they can camouflage themselves? There are lots of videos on Youtube showing the RGB values of grass, dirt, stone etc.

Overall, it's a nice but frustrating zombie survival, with possibilities to helpful communities, or to KOS players.

(updated because of game awards)
("updated" for game awards part 2)