Recent reviews by Storm

Hollow Knight is easily one of the best games I have ever played. The mysterious, captivating, and refreshing story and setting, the fun characters, the near-flawless gameplay experience, the sheer amount of content, everything culminates into a fantastic experience that is absolutely worth it.


(no spoilers obviously)

The Story and Setting of Hollow Knight are both very imaginative, and very well executed. In a underground ruined kingdom of bugs, there is a lot of striking and original characters, areas, and scenes. The story starts out very mysterious and the game trusts you to dig a little deeper to look for lore, but even without going too far into the conspiracy theory zone you get a rather moving and engaging story that is absolutely worth going into completely blind, and paying attention to.


There are loads of NPCs, bosses, enemies, and allies to see in the world of Hallownest. Many of which have their own stories and quests to work through in this game. Character and Boss designs are very unique and look very good, as does the game as a whole with its incredible art style. Many of these characters have very human and lovable personalities, whether it be the laid back Elderbug, or the stoic Hornet, and many more. Many of their own questlines may tug at the heartstrings or make you smile. Overall, Hollow Knight has an amazing cast of characters.


Now a great world can only go so far and isn't worth much if it sucks to play through. Luckily, gameplay is Hollow Knights strongest aspect, although that by no means is to say that the other aspects of the game aren't stellar. Hollow Knight is a 2D platforming-heavy Metroidvania, and it nails it's genre. the world is laid out absolutely perfectly, exploration is such a fun time, theres tons of secrets, upgrades, and items to be found, and tons of bosses to fight (which I will expand on soon). Movement, combat, customization, upgrades, abilities, progression, Team Cherry knocked it out of the park with every single one. This game feels absolutely amazing to play through and through. There is so much skill expression in this game it feels so amazing to see yourself improve.


There are MANY bosses to fight in Hollow Knight, and almost every single one is an absolute blast to fight. They all have very unique designs and mechanics, boss themes, and arenas, making the cast all stand out and never feel same or repetitive, despite the large number of bosses. They vary wildly in difficulty, but I'd say nothing feels too unfair or too annoying, with the exception of one totally optional boss cough GPZ cough and some optional side content that is SUPPOSED to be brutally difficult. Speaking of difficulty...


Overall, I'd say Hollow Knight is on the more challenging side of games. While I think the hardest challenges and bosses the game has to throw at you are optional, there are certainly some difficult parts in the mainline, mandatory story, ESPECIALLY considering how open ended this game can be, a new player could stumble into some of the harder areas of the game after only three or four boss fights just by exploring. However, nothing ever felt unfair or frustrating to me. I like challenge in video games, but difficult needs to be done right. Something like Getting Over It is just designed to piss you off and isn't fun to me. But Hollow Knight is a challenging game, that knows how to treat it's players fairly, and let them improve and surpass these hurdles it throws at them without them getting burnt out. I think the difficult of this game is handled expertly, but if you don't like hard games, maybe this game isn't for you.


The music in this game is absolutely top notch no question. area themes, boss themes, cut scene music, everything is absolutely incredible. Music is memorable, it conveys the exact mood it's going for every time, and the music never feels like it blends too much together. The soundtrack of this game is absolutely, without a question, top tier.


Hollow Knight is a beautifully crafted game with basically flawless execution. You can feel the passion from the devs when you play this game, and you can feel your own excitement, joy, sadness, triumph, and more as you make your way through the world of Hallownest. I would absolutely recommend this 10/10 game to anyone.

I can't wait for Silksong to come out in 2035 :)

Short, but extremely well made. The story while simple, is wonderfully written. The art and overall tone is very cute, but expect sad moments as well. I have only gotten one ending so far, but i certainly plan to get them all.

Risk of Rain 2 is one of the best roguelites i have ever played. Enjoyable challenge and gameplay loop, lost of interesting items and many unlocks to work towards, interesting level and character design, many secrets to discover... and most importantly of all, quality, constant dev support. I recommend this game to ANYONE.

Really fun tactical game. Interesting mechanics and very interesting characters.

Before I leave this review I would like to have everyone realize one thing:

This IS a P2P game. To access the later worlds you must either buy them or have a membership.

This is not new for MMO's, so I never found it a problem. The membership pricing is very fair as well.

Now, onto the review. I think this game is great. I have played it for years on the original launcher, maxed several wizards, and spent countless hours in the game. I love the themes, the combat, and the story. The themes are very fantasy driven, with you attending a Hogwarts-esque school of magic, called Ravenwood. There are 7 schools of magic you can focus on: Storm, Ice, Fire, Death, Myth, Life, and Balance. These different schools will grant you different spells and access to different kinds of gear. You can also gain training points to get spells from other schools, but there are only a few spells that I would consider ever using outside of your school. It is a very child friendly game, so things can get a little corny at times, but overall I think they handled the story well.

The combat is what I REALLY want to talk about. I've always been a fan of Turn-Based RPG's, so I may be biased, but I think this game has some of the best MMO combat I have ever seen. It involves you making a deck of spell cards, and facing an enemy in a circle that rotates clockwise to indicate who's turn it is. there can be up to 4 allies and 4 enemies in a battle, and later worlds will add more enemies joining than allies. As the turns pass you gain things called Pips. These are what are used to cast spells. More powerful cards cost more pips, but also have better effects. Later in the game you also gain the ability to gain Power Pips. These are special yellow pips that will count as 2 pips towards a spell of your school. For example, I have Cyclops, a 3 pip cost Myth spell, and Banshee, a 3 pip cost Death spell, in my hand. I have one normal pip, and one power pip, and I am a Myth wizard. I would only be able to cast Cyclops, because of the matching schools.

Much later you can also get Shadow Pips, that work with Shadow magic, but you don't need to know about these right now. As the game progresses you gain more and more spells to fight tougher and tougher enemies. The game can be a little grindy at some points, especially in the 40-60 range, but overall, I think the combat is fun and engaging, and at no point would I say that the game is P2W.

Lastly, I will talk about PvP. There are a few PvP meta levels, but i think the most balanced is around level 30-40. I will say that the PvP in this game is probably it's weakest aspect, in my opinion. It can become very unbalanced at times, especially at the higher levels, and the community can be very toxic. The good news, however, is that PvP is completely optional. YOu never need to do it if you don't want to, all the gear you get from PvP is not balanced for the main story, so you will find better gear in dungeons and questing. The currency you get from winning PvP battles, Arena Tickets, can also be gained in other ways, to buy gear suited for other acitivities.

Overall, I think Wizard101 is a great game that you should give a try if you like MMO's and turn-based combat, ust be willing to pay for access to the later part of the game.