Recent reviews by VICE

I don't care if the changes were minor, I didn't want them and the game was fine before.

The most beautiful atmosphere.
An incredible soundtrack.
Very riveting narrative with all sorts of twists and turns.
Hunting mutants, navigating anomalies, getting artifacts- seeing the Zone for what it is would make this a perfect game.
You have to eat, sleep, maintain your gear, and deal with a unique economy.

Unfortunately, it loses all of its charm the moment you get into a gunfight.
Enemies see you immediately upon spawning, and they will often spawn about 20 meters behind you in the middle of the woods. If they somehow do not spot you upon arriving, they soon will, as you cannot hide even behind solid objects.
Enemies land 100% of their shots they take at you. If you are not behind cover, you should treat even the lowliest leather-jacket clad bandit as a walking turret because they will *never* miss a shot (unless they have a shotgun).

I love STALKER series, and I want to love this game, but unfortunately it is a shooter and that means I have to engage in its unfair firefights. Save for actual buildings, no object is solid enough to stop bullets and enemies will sometimes just shoot via x-ray vision at you through solid material, and every single enemy hucks grenade after grenade as if the Zone is made of them. I don't want to pre-order a game and then have to mod the hell out of it just to get it to feel playable.

I hope to see some marked improvement and I want to edit this review to say more positive things once these issues have been ironed out. What was shipped to us was part masterpiece, part uncooked 2010 shooter knock-off.

The best with no contenders. Movement, climbing, combat, stealth, archery, and magic- zero competition the absolute best VR game, (and with mods, its even fun to use guns!)

If you like Blade & Sorcery, you needn't bother. I was curious simply for the progression and varied enemy types, but don't fall for it- nothing feels more unnatural in VR than it does to "sword-fight" in this game.

Fun shooter with style to it.

Lovely game. Soundtrack is bumping, combat is frenetic but demands precision. Plot so far is porn-level writing but you weren't looking at this game for a plot.

As a Hotline Miami super-fan, I came for what seemed to be a stylistic clone and stayed for something that stands on its own two feet with a unique rogue-like experience and frantic violence.

This game beat me up and took my rations, 10/10

I think this game is good, but there's a big caveat; when you play physics-based games like this, it is so important to have responsive controls and actions from whatever you are controlling. Operating cranes and swinging from ropes is fine to be a little slippery in terms of response, but idk how many times I've thrown the scan-ball instead of drawing my pistol because of a fat finger. You've got like six little critters five feet in front of you and instead of quickly correcting your accidental button push, you commit to a full animation of pulling out a little scan ball and throwing it ahead of you (letting your character get eaten). I've only played for a bit and I love the atmosphere and even the frantic combat, but I don't understand this design choice. There should be a ready state where you're holding the ball *before* you activate it, just in case you didn't mean to. Or even better, a big *ABORT* button to exit the scan ball once thrown (it's implied to be your Scout controlling it, yes? He'd stop controlling his little wal-mart drone if he were about to get eaten). Other than that gripe, this game is tight.

Visuals: Gritty Flash game, like Barotrauma. A good, unique quality and style.
Audio: Excellent. SFX and ambient music are both chilling and immersive.
Gameplay: Every character is a drunk toddler but hopefully you'll get used to it

Overall: 9.3/10

Love this ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ game man.

Gameplay is a perfect blend between a traditional RPG and the rogue-like. "Classes" are determined by which weapon you take, with the boons and specific aspects you select of those weapons functioning as a winding tree of subclasses. Every weapon is fun to use and has their own strengths and weaknesses. My favorite so far is the certain ranged weapon you unlock last...

The environment, characters and voice acting immerse you in this Gods vs. Gods opera of Olympus and the Underworld, with some individuals in-between. The voice acting is top-tier, the stages are beautiful and haven't felt repetitive once in my two-dozen-or-so runs (this game will constantly surprise you!), and the characters are well-written as is expected of the developers.

I don't know how to review music in a professional way that can convey to you how ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ killer this soundtrack is. From the low-intensity moments of respite, to the Doom-esque thrasher riffs wailing away during the boss fights, you won't hear a better soundtrack for a underworld romp.

Grab this game! It's so good and I wish I got it sooner.

Phenomenal shooter. Turns the mindless ripping and tearing into something sophisticated while maintaining the original's pure brutality. Only thing I didn't like were the Marauder enemies... They weren't extremely consistent in terms of the game's proposed strategy, which was rather jarring at times but when you learn to trust the second plasma weapon you get, the whole game gets much easier.