Recent reviews by Atomic AlienZ

A nice, albeit a bit short, touch-up of a game from the old good times when Ubies were making good games.

Now it comes with their own "Ubislop connect", or whatever it's called, that tries to install something on my system, and those ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up Steam integration.

TLDR: I liked it, since I've never played the original. Comes with bloatware. Still worth the buy.

Kinda nice. Got repetitive at the end, so I rushed the last act of the story, but still an enjoyable experience.

Meh. got it for about 2 euros for multiplayer with friends, it's worth about that.

The levels are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ gorgeous: I'm getting it screenshotted as an introductory material for my friend that's new to WH40k. My only gripe with level design is that devs either got lazy, or rushed, so the last 2 missions just reuse the same maps from previous ones.

Unfortunately that's where the good things end. Gameplay is boring: you just stand and pour lead down the corridor, then move. In case of flamer or autocannon, you can't even see where you're shooting, which makes sense, and also spares you the suffering\ of seeing the same enemy model/clunky animations over and over and over again. Enemies are almost indistinguishable from one another: your standard genestealer, same but bigger, same but even bigger, and the purple exploding ♥♥♥♥♥ that does un-emperory amounts of damage, and the "second tier" of same old tyranids, but after they ate Dr. Zoidberg and grew tentacles on their faces. Gunplay is unrewarding, the guns feel kinda same-y, and although it makes sense to have no recoil in a 5-ton terminator suit, it just feels wrong.

All in all, worth byuing only heavily discounted, and only if you're a fan of WH40k.

Usually crashes after a couple hours of play, but looks good, combat feels good, the story is nice, and the main characters arcs are frigging awesome.

There's a slight problem with "filler" content: too easy to get waylaid at times by sidequests, but nothing extreme, and being waylaid is a "me" problem after all.

All in all - a very solid game, a satisfying resolution to the story.

Oh, this was a ride and a half!
Sure, it's not so married-couple-oriented as It Takes Two, and it starts kinda slow, but it gets more interesting as it progresses. The devs did a stellar work: from the visuals, to the gameplay: I'm not a fan of platformers (because I suck at them), but I enjoyed every bit.
The characters are well-written, I can relate to both protagonists' stories, and the dialogues combine light-hearted humour with personal stories, as characters slowly open up to each other.

There's an issue though: the game is a bit unbalanced, the (temporary) abilities that one of the character gains often feel "underwhelming" compared to the abilities of the other character, and my SO didn't stop ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about it.

"You get to swim as a cute otter-fish, and you get to smash things and swing from tree branches as a giant ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ ape, yet all I can do is what? Grow some ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ flowers?! And the dragons! Your can fly and spit acid, yet mine cosplays a really scaly roly-poly! It's unfair!" end quote.

All in all - great game, a fine continuation of Hazelight's cooperatives, well worth a buy and a playthrough with your SO.

A bit worse than HZD all in all, unfortunately Steam does not allow neutral reviews.

Pros:
- The world is as bloody beautiful as in the first installment
- The machine design is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ awesome
- Combat is nice and fluid, it's extremely satisfying to finally down that bloody thunderjaw with a shot to the eye
- Action cinematics are spectacular
- Tons of new machines to kill, including a giant snek
- One of antagonists is a caricature of a certain someone that has to do with a certain website that's named very "equatorially"

Mehs:
- Stealth aspect suffers from the "I'm in tall grass with my head poking out but you can't see me" syndrome
- Tons and tons of new weapons with no incentive to use them. I never used anything but a hunter bow, and occasionally - the "sniper" bow
- The plot is alright: a bit out of place, but it's serviceable and keeps semi-engaged in combination with pro-s

Cons:
- Characters are generally flat and cliche-d. Positive characters are all goody-two-shoes. Antagonists are all "operette villains"-grade sociopaths, with mania of control, paranoia, and the whole shebang.
- They've changed Aloy's appearance that does not look like age and does not really match with her lifestyle. Dunno what for, especially considering HFW takes place 6 months after HZD
- The guy that designed clamberjaws needs to be ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ by one. I ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ hate monkeys, and clamberjaw takes the prize as the most annoying machine to fight. On second thought, this can go to the pros

The good:
- Combat is satisfying: apart from a couple unfair bosses, it's smooth, challenging just right (personal opinion) and spectacular
- New combat stances: you can now fight with a blaster (sword moves resemble rapier, neat), or with a "heavy" two-handed blade, similar to one of that whiny ♥♥♥♥♥'s, Kylo Ren or whatever he's called
- Main character development is good: you get to live through betrayal, loss, and dip a toe into the dork side
- Most of the other characters are decently written. With classic Star Wars' "Just believe in yourself" ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, but still
- Visuals are nice: the world looks really good, and cinematics are top notch
- You get to kick Big V's ass a little

The bad:
- The story is much less "epic" than the first game: instead of going into warzones, climbing AT-ATs, and infiltrating witch covens, Cal... kicks some raiders' ass on the backwater planet in the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of nowhere? Meh
- The story feels too long: although it lasts about 40 hours, it feels like an unimpactful slog
- Some characters' motivations are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ stupid. Won't go into details to avoid spoilers
- Most of the story happens on one single planet
All in all, my main gripe is with the story: someone has cheaped out on the writers' department.

The ugly:
- Performance issues on PC that haven't been addressed for almost 2 years. In a game that is meant to be epic and immersive. And no, I'm not locking my refresh rate to 60 to fix it

It would have been a neutral/positive review if EA actually supported their games (I know, I ask too much).

It's just worse than the previous: much smaller and much shallower.

PROS:
- The combat is still satisfying
- Clans are kinda cool (you need to know the lore though)
- Characters are alright
- Graphics look OK
- Levels feel bigger/more interesting than in the Mercenaries

CONS:
- Story is meh, and is generally not needed there
- Facial animations are horrendous: as if every one of the characters has their face constantly electrocuted, or have brain damage. The ticks and tremors are very off-putting. Also, overabundance of bared teeth reminds me of toothpaste commercials
- The "freeform" playstyle of the previous game is gone: you are railroaded through a series of missions and progression, no more procedurally-generated missions/store inventories, no more hunting for rare variants or weapons
- Loss has no cost: papa mama saKhan will foot the bill, and also shower you in all the latest clan tech. No more hunting for that SL-era gauss cannon
- General lack of mechs: there are only 25 mechs each with 5-6 variants (MW 5 Mercenaries had 58 in base game + 4 from DLCs, up to 367 variants), and worst of all - there's no sense of achievement in getting a "hero" mech, they are just given to you
- General lack of mission variety: It's usually "get to the navpoint, deal with opposition, repeat". Although it's worth mentioning that some missions are pretty cool/have interesting mechanics, like the one where you have to stealth your way into several bases (some suspension of disbelief required)
- General lack of biomes: there are about 4.5 of them, one of which has a single ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ mission in it
- Optimization is a bit lacking, although it runs reasonably well on my machine, it sometimes has weird FPS dips which are temporarily cured by changing the DLSS settings
- Something weird is happening with sound: sometimes it's absent/too quiet in cutscenes

TL;DR: much shallower than the previous game but still has interesting things

I don't even know where to start with this one.

Visuals? Yeah, I'm a sucker for low-poly graphics, but the actual design is unbelievably good: a perfect, absurd, and funny blend of tacticool "delta-six" spec-ops gear and whimsical fantasy stuff. Silenced wizard wand with a laser designator? Gimme two!

Memorable quirky characters you can relate to? Oh, my sweet Jen, how I understand your pain. The only difference is - I'm already in therapy. Well-written dialogues, full of wit and (sometimes not-so-)lighthearted humor? Aplenty! A rare game makes me laugh that much as this one.

The actual plot is nice and unobtrusive and, in my humble opinion, serves more to highlight the characters.

There's a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of bite-sized levels, yet they don't get stale: every couple of them there's a new mechanic, or a new enemy to overcome, so it feels fresh until the end. And afterwards, game throws a bit more at you, just for the hell of it.

All in all - it's an awesome game, a real gem, lovingly-crafted, and very well-written.

10/10, loved every second of it!

That was a rollercoaster and a half! Better than the base game!

Got all of the endings, felt heartbroken for 2 weeks straight. If that does not tell you everything you need, what will?