Recent reviews by BVSSIC

wiz-art

(Copy and pasted from the demo)

I want to give this a 'yes' recommended, but the problems I have currently as a keyboard player outweigh the fun I could be having, and am having with Rivals 1. I will update this review if the below-mentioned 'issues' are changed or fixed.

Given the fact that this is a direct sequel or spiritual successor to Rivals of Aether, on top of having played hundreds of hours on the original game, I will be making some very direct comparisons between the two throughout this review.

Rivals of Aether 2 is a game I see a LOT of promise in.
I really enjoy my time playing the demo, and the difference in netcode is so incredibly nice to play. BUT, there are just a couple things I want to mention, because they make the game feel incredibly jank for keyboard players like myself:

In the original Rivals of Aether, you could go through a pretty in-depth tutorial/training section where the game teaches you about basic mechanics to more complex mechanics. This was a really great way for people to get into the feel of Rivals in the beginning and most importantly, didn't require an online connection. In the demo for Rivals 2, this is lacking.
Instead, you're presented with a "New Players Guide": An external link to an official wiki for the game, that requires you to have internet connection. Who thought this was a good idea?? What happens when you don't have internet and want to learn more about the game, you just give up??

In the original Rivals of Aether, the default was walking and holding to sprint. The way that game handled sprinting was very nice as you could quite literally hold the sprint button forever, and whenver you landed on a platform the next possible time you could sprint, you would sprint.
In this game, that is somewhat the case... See, the default is now that you run by default. A change I'm not against, and I like the inclusion of being able to switch it back to Rivals 1, but when doing so, problems occur:

• When you hold the sprint button or walk mod button, you start sprinting, but as soon as you land on another surface, you stop sprinting and you either have to press the walk mod button again after landing or press the directional key again to sprint. Annoying when I want to be able to just let go of the sprint key and not sprint (This seems logical?)
  
• Pressing opposing directional keys doesn't cycle between the two, it instead combines into a halt, which is a lot less useful.
  
• Compared to the original Rivals of Aether, Sprinting does not actually create momentum for jumps, resulting in sluggish feeling movement as you suddenly loose all your speed from sprinting. This also denies certain interesting combos from occuring like the first game as some of them actually required the momentum gained from sprinting to land properly.
  
• No fast falling when auto-walk is enabled (the option that turns the walk mod into the original Rivals of Aether.
  (also why is there a timer on when you can fast fall?? This seems so counter-intuitive for interesting combos.) Fixed
  
• Can not drop through platforms by double-tapping when auto-walk is enabled. Fixed
  
• Can not dodge in a direction out of shield because the game thinks you are walking. (you should always be able to do this, not only when sprinting, it just doesn't make sense.)

• No music selection in character selection screen (this was so cool in the first game)
  
• No Abyss mode and interesting variations for characters it brought in the original Rivals (please add this or a variant!!)
  
• Animations sometimes eat up buffer frames (Turn-around animations, Land animations) resulting in frustrating "Wtf, I pressed that" situations.

So with those negative things out of the way, I AM really enjoying Rivals 2 despite the issues listed above. Right now, it just feels so incredibly jank to play on keyboard with a setup similar to Rivals 1. Walk mod needs to not override certain actions like falling through platforms and dashing out of shields, etc. I am absolutely loving the effects and visual flair of this game, and although I'm a big sucker for pixel art, it's a nice change of pace.

I'm hoping the user-made content for this game will be plenty, but I'm a little afraid it'll be harder to make good characters once the tools are released since the 2d and pixel art nature of the original game allowed people to easily get into modding the game. The modding scene is a big reason why the original game is as big as it got, so I'm praying here!

Can't wait to see where this game goes, for now though, I have a lot more fun playing the original rivals and I'll probably bounce between the two!

still p cool!

I want to give this a 'yes' recommended, but the problems I have currently as a keyboard player outweigh the fun I could be having, and am having with Rivals 1. I will update this review if the below-mentioned 'issues' are changed or fixed.

Given the fact that this is a direct sequel or spiritual successor to Rivals of Aether, on top of having played hundreds of hours on the original game, I will be making some very direct comparisons between the two throughout this review.

Rivals of Aether 2 is a game I see a LOT of promise in.
I really enjoy my time playing the demo, and the difference in netcode is so incredibly nice to play. BUT, there are just a couple things I want to mention, because they make the game feel incredibly jank for keyboard players like myself:

In the original Rivals of Aether, you could go through a pretty in-depth tutorial/training section where the game teaches you about basic mechanics to more complex mechanics. This was a really great way for people to get into the feel of Rivals in the beginning and most importantly, didn't require an online connection. In the demo for Rivals 2, this is lacking.
Instead, you're presented with a "New Players Guide": An external link to an official wiki for the game, that requires you to have internet connection. Who thought this was a good idea?? What happens when you don't have internet and want to learn more about the game, you just give up??

In the original Rivals of Aether, the default was walking and holding to sprint. The way that game handled sprinting was very nice as you could quite literally hold the sprint button forever, and whenver you landed on a platform the next possible time you could sprint, you would sprint.
In this game, that is somewhat the case... See, the default is now that you run by default. A change I'm not against, and I like the inclusion of being able to switch it back to Rivals 1, but when doing so, problems occur:

• When you hold the sprint button or walk mod button, you start sprinting, but as soon as you land on another surface, you stop sprinting and you either have to press the walk mod button again after landing or press the directional key again to sprint. Annoying when I want to be able to just let go of the sprint key and not sprint (This seems logical?)
  
• Pressing opposing directional keys doesn't cycle between the two, it instead combines into a halt, which is a lot less useful.
  
• Compared to the original Rivals of Aether, Sprinting does not actually create momentum for jumps, resulting in sluggish feeling movement as you suddenly loose all your speed from sprinting. This also denies certain interesting combos from occuring like the first game as some of them actually required the momentum gained from sprinting to land properly.
  
• No fast falling when auto-walk is enabled (the option that turns the walk mod into the original Rivals of Aether.
  (also why is there a timer on when you can fast fall?? This seems so counter-intuitive for interesting combos.)
  
• Can not drop through platforms by double-tapping when auto-walk is enabled.
  
• Can not dodge in a direction out of shield because the game thinks you are walking. (you should always be able to do this, not only when sprinting, it just doesn't make sense.)

• No music selection in character selection screen (this was so cool in the first game)
  
• No Abyss mode and interesting variations for characters it brought in the original Rivals (please add this or a variant!!)
  
• Animations sometimes eat up buffer frames (Turn-around animations, Land animations) resulting in frustrating "Wtf, I pressed that" situations.

So with those negative things out of the way, I AM really enjoying Rivals 2 despite the issues listed above. Right now, it just feels so incredibly jank to play on keyboard with a setup similar to Rivals 1. Walk mod needs to not override certain actions like falling through platforms and dashing out of shields, etc. I am absolutely loving the effects and visual flair of this game, and although I'm a big sucker for pixel art, it's a nice change of pace.

I'm hoping the user-made content for this game will be plenty, but I'm a little afraid it'll be harder to make good characters once the tools are released since the 2d and pixel art nature of the original game allowed people to easily get into modding the game. The modding scene is a big reason why the original game is as big as it got, so I'm praying here!

Can't wait to see where this game goes, for now though, I have a lot more fun playing the original rivals and I'll probably bounce between the two!

souls

AOM is back. Prob one of the best remakes I've seen in a while for RTS.
Faithful to the original, creative in utilizing the new tech and adding QOL features.

Runs surprisingly smooth! (I hate that I have to say that)
Runs honestly even better in a lot of cases than the extended edition from a decade ago, which I find very funny.

One minor gripe that won't affect most people:
Although I appreciate that the editor from the original game is pretty much untouched in here, I do wish the boxes weren't dark grey, It makes it tougher to read the text as opposed to the black on white. It could also REALLY utilize smart search filtering for triggers, units, etc.

Anyway, absolute gem.

If this wasn't DLC it would've (probably) been goty for me.
Really enjoy the higher ante of difficulty in the DLC.

Fromsoft knows you'll have plenty of stuff by the time you get to the DLC, so room for experimentation when it comes to builds is way higher than the base game.
With the base game, you were able to beat most bosses with a certain build, but in the DLC, the game asks you to REALLY thoroughly think about your strategies and your approaches to bosses. Some strategies will 100% be more advantageous than others for certain bosses.

I was stuck on a boss around the midpoint of the DLC, basically throwing my head against a brickwall trying to defeat them with a not-so-optimal build for that fight. I experimented with tears, different gear, different stats, even different summons and the sense of completion I felt after beating the boss NONE has come close to in the base game or even anything in other souls games.
It's crazy how much different gear you can experiment with and a lot of the gear in the dlc also has special properties you can read up on in the descriptions, so it felt super cathartic!

I basically have slight complaints which is that the framerate would dip here and there on certain attacks with an insane amount of flair (something I'm very sure will get fixed over time through hot patches as fromsoft has ALWAYS done), and another one, which is not really a complaint, but more-so an observation, which is that the map (as in the map you put pins down) is quite deceiving.
The base game's world is built around horizontal exploration and expansion, whereas the DLC's world is more focused on vertical exploration and expansion, something which I've never seen in a fromsoft game to this degree.
I absolutely LOVE the vertical approach and it creates this really interesting landscape, however, because the map is displayed top-down, it actually makes coming up with ways to get around a lot more confusing without other sub-maps.
So again, not a major complaint, but more-so an observation. I'm sure Fromsoft will be updating the map over time, just like the base game, to make things stand out more or make more sense for more people!

Lastly, I think the only valid negative reviews I've seen so far for this DLC are the framerate issues. I think that is totally valid, and people with higher graphics cards than me should NOT be having issues (I'm using a 3060Ti with mostly very high and some maximum graphics on 1440p with no ray tracing).

18 hours in, finally hit the "thanks for playing Early Access" screen and Wow, this has been a CRAZY experience. Hades II really makes you realize how good Supergiant's touch is on games. Love and care put in everything.

Ver 0.9 is lacking some of the sprites you would expect in the full game and are using placeholders for them, but mechanically speaking, everything works like you would expect. When the full game comes out expect those little extra details to come through as they'll finish it up.

This is Early Access done right.

Made by artists for artists tbh
Very tightly crafted journey, I had 0 complaints

This is the lovechild of Fez, Hyper Light Drifter and Legend of Zelda and it's absolutely amazing.

Huge respect for the effort went into it and especially the audio!!! Actually some of the best usage of audio I've seen maybe ever.