Recent reviews by mjaau

So, Schedule I Free Sample... Not gonna lie, I thought the demo would basically be your character stuck in an endless loop in prologue town with the same 5 customers, but damn was I wrong. Instead you get to roam around freely in like half of Hyland Point, which is quite nice. There's a great amount of content in here, so kudos to the dev!

Now, gameplay wise Schedule I is honestly way too fun for a simulator. Personally I could play for hours on end, it's very addictive. Typically in similar games the sense of progression comes from expanding your business, but most of them fail to provide a real end goal. The gameplay loop goes on forever, or in other words you can never truly beat the game. Schedule I has a decent storyline and a whole ahh city for you to explore. Obviously, it's an open world game, so there's that. But you can also play with friends! What more can you ask for, right? Right.

As for the demo itself, it has almost no issues. Bugs? What are those? In 10+ hours of playing this, I only experienced a single one, which was respawning inside the warehouse (while getting chased lol) after messing up a jump and landing in water nearby. The warehouse was empty and I thought I had trapped myself, but no, I was able to leave through one of the backdoors, crazy. Leads me to think that this has been thought of and while it hasn't been patched, the solution was rather simple.
Oh, and I guess at some point I failed a few deals, since game time randomly broke. Fortunately, it was already night and even though time was frozen I was able to go to sleep. And I never really had that issue again lol.

I have to say, this is one hell of a demo. It was tons of fun and anything but short, so I will be getting the full game as soon as it goes on sale, that's for sure :)

A game from my childhood, and a good one at that. A bit buggy but tons of fun, especially with friends! Totally recommended :)

Somehow this is a worse game than AS2 Conscription. Not that there was anything wrong with Conscription, but its garbage english lines really hold it back, unlike AS2 Reloaded which is a masterpiece.

Anyway, here once again we have no voice lines, which would have been fine...if they stuck with the original mechanics of the game.
Mission 1 introduces a ranged spider...mkay, not a fan of that but it's a minor thing.
Running around feels janky, shooting is not really all that satisfying, reloading is pretty much garbage.
They changed sounds for a lot of interactions/objects, including reloading your weapons which personally turns me off.
Bit of a nitpick, but UI is kinda trash, I cannot easily tell if my mags are almost empty or how many shots I have left before having to reload as in the older games. Sometimes simple is better, I guess.
Secrets are...underwhelming? I don't feel like I've discovered a secret place in the map at all. The fact that it's likely going to be money, money and more money makes me wonder if they're just side cash bonuses that if you happen to miss, it's really not that big of a deal. After all you can just get better guns randomly and without having to spend anything, right? Right.

Moving on...you may have no more than 2 weapons equipped (primary and secondary), which is fair. I did feel like carrying around 5 heavy guns in AS2R and AS2C is a bit unrealistic. But then you can pick up every other item off the ground and uh, what?

So...we get limited inventory space now? Why not just limit the amount of loot drops??
This leads into to my other point. Guns drop from kills now (and quite often too). Sorry, let me say that again...you get new guns as random drops...from aliens?! Oh come onn...naw, that's the dealbreaker for me.
As if that wasn't enough, crates now drop money and only money (who tf stashes their savings in crates), while aliens drop guns, fun!...not really

You can't choose a character, you just jump in as some beefy dude with armor that reminds me of the Resident Evil guy lol. There is no character upgrade system too...spending points after a level up in the older games is just that satisfying for me I guess...aand it's missing in this one.

Oh, and did I also mention that you have...unlimited ammo?? Yeah, about that. No more ammo packs to be picked up from the ground or randomly from crates :((

Conclusion: This game is literally an AS2R at home meme. Sadge, considering how this is supposed to be the new and improved reboot version :p

I got the game from a SEGA promo bundle or something. Decided to try it... and I fell in love. So much so that I recommended it to my friends and had them play it as well.

Allow me to point out a very crucial detail about Condemned and that is... it's an old game. The port isn't perfect. You will have to follow the guide over at pcgamingwiki in order to uncap your fps and acquire some missing sound files. After that, you're good to go. Play on hard, as everything below that difficulty is kind of a joke lol.

While the story may not be everyone's thing, it definitely has its charm. Personally, I hate getting spoiled about anything, soo all I'll say is, it was enjoyable for me, hopefully it is for you too :)

Combat system (for the most part) is amazing! I can't stop praising it. Combined with an insanely good sound design, this is kind of the definition of a good action horror game. I say horror... but in reality you're mostly just beating the shii out of hobos & junkies lol. With an axe. Or a pipe. Or... whatever else you can find, really.

Expect a lot of melee fights, as this is no game where you magically find ammo for your gun from fallen enemies. No, no. Here, you get an average of 6 bullets. That's it. Use them wisely, you never know where the next hobo is hiding or if he's got a gun.
Pro tip: Conserve ammo for gun fights and enjoy the 1 on 1s the game has to offer. You have a taser, but using it really feels like cheating. I'm definitely guilty of abusing it, though with how many encounters the game throws at you, I think it's a decent alternative of dealing with them crazy hobos from time to time :p

You will find yourself in melee situations like 90% of the time, though Chapter 6 does throw quite the organized bandit group at you. They all have guns, so using the taser then is absolutely justified. Other than that, you can have a lot of fun with melee and that should be your preferred style of play. It's how you'll get the most out of the game :)

I also have to mention, the AI for Condemned is soo good. I was lowkey impressed when I first noticed that the game doesn't just throw some guy at you and expect you to whoop his aah so you can pass an invisible check and be on your way to the next. No, the enemies in this game are smarter than that. They will hide, they will ambush you and sometimes even work in groups, which left me speechless. Peak game design for 2005.

TL;DR Condemned: Criminal Origins is a masterpiece. Grab on sale and you won't regret it. Game was ahead of its time, get past the visuals and I guarantee you'll end up impressed. Personally I'd love to see a remaster at some point (better sooner than later), but I'd happily trade that for a port of its sequel, Bloodshot any day!

Amazing game, trash devs. First they released Definitive Edition and stopped updating this one (which is fair), but then they tried goading the playerbase to their new game while literally acting as if this game never existed.

People who played AoE in their childhood are here for this game specifically, not DE!!
If you want to get this on sale, forget it :( Devs are now making sales for their "new" definitive games exclusively, which is peak REEtarded behavior.

In other words, this gem here will never go on sale again. Oh...did I also mention they drained the logo of all colour and added retired to the title... like who does that?!

IT'S WESKIN' TIME

Coming from Duel Links, I have to say...this game is a straight upgrade in every possible way!

***Duel Links RANT***

Sure, you could play as any character in Duel Links, provided you had them unlocked. And they had some cool voice lines and stuff. But the grind was just...unbearable.

Want a new character? Grind for them (endlessly). Or maybe you want to build a cool deck? Open packs (farm gems or pay to play in order to do so), in hopes of pulling a Mystic Tomato (for example) just so you can finish building your Fiend deck...
And don't even get me started on the card crafting system - the card trader stock refreshes and...again, nothing useful! For the...10th time in a row? -.-

The glossy/prismatic craft costs are insane. You spend hours and hours farming jewels to craft...and for what? PvP? Ha. Ha. You get matched vs someone from the other side of the world and his sh*tty connection will not allow you to enjoy the game, like at all. And he's probably playing meta too. No thanks.

PvE? The same events in rotation, over and over again until it gets so boring it's not even worth to join them and try to farm the good cards (ah, let's not forget that feeling when you've already grinded the hell out of an event and it makes a return in less than a month with the same stuff to farm for lol).

***End of Duel Links RANT***


Alright, time to talk about Master Duel. Pros? Let's see...

* doesn't force you to do PvP (even though it is mainly PvP)

* has a proper tutorial, doesn't instantly throw online opponents with meta decks at you.
Instead game makes sure to explain every mechanic (even if you haven't played YGO before)

* in solo mode you can play against AI with pretty basic but decent enough decks to challenge the starter decks you are given after finishing tutorials.

* you can even play test your decks vs said AI if you're building a fun/meme deck! And...you still get rewarded for doing so? (just a quick parallel, in Duel Links, you autoduel vs a random duelist, then
a. most of the time you get nothing out of it and
b. autoduel is so stupid you can actually lose -.-

Starter decks? After the tutorial and ~ 1-3 duels vs AI you can ditch those and start building any decks you want. Just open some packs, dismantle unwanted cards and craft whatever you need. Every card is accessible through crafting (generating) and not locked to just being pulled from packs :)

You get rewarded. Let me say that again, rewarded.
In Duel Links you'd be getting a single R jewel per duel, if you're lucky. Here you get crystals. For literally everything you do...yes, much like Duel Links' gems but you only need 100 per pack and that's amazing. Whatever you pull from packs you can turn into crafting points. Then you just craft the cards you want ;)

In conclusion, I have to say...this is the premium dueling simulator experience. Ranked, campaign, deckbuilding, deck testing, no grind - all here. Superior to Duel Links in every way.

***The Rant***

Man where do I start... well, with what bothers me the most - I hate linear VNs. Especially ones this g a y.

Even the only guy in this wears a purple sweater, like what the heck.
Just... why? Would have been a much better story if it was about this group of friends (yes, friends) going through college and stuff.

What started as a nice lil VN quickly took a 180 degree turn and became... uh, I dunno, the most boring cringe ever? But oh well, I was already halfway through - might as well finish it. I regret that decision now...

After getting to Act 2 you'll start noticing something. Story feels...rushed? I'm talking about the insane amount of typos, but also the general flow of it all. Plotholes are starting to surface and they leave you with tons of questions. In other words, reading becomes quite the tedious experience, with all the inconsistencies and what not.

Incoherence is the name of the game. I was still somewhat excited to keep going at the start of Act 2. I was quickly turned off by the fact that the whole game is clearly a message in the form of comfort and assurance for individuals who have yet to come out and that it's okay. Well...no. Just no. To be frank, I don't mind. I really don't. But the way this was done triggers me. You just don't open up into a sweet lil VN like this and slowly unfold into nothing but yuri.
My question is...did it really have to be this way? Why couldn't this be about finding friends in college? Oh and I don't know, at least give us a choice to make lol.

If you really love reading yuri, then this is for you. If not, go find something better, this VN here just isn't worth your time..

I love the possibilities and what you can do with decks in this game. I also love the fact it requires more than one brain cell to play. I find myself constantly playing out possible scenarios in my head and "what ifs" when I'm playing my decks. The game does have a steep learning curve, true, but once you get the hang of most mechanics and get familiar with what some cards do it's a lot easier to dive into deckbuilding which is honestly the most fun you can ever have here, in my opinion. Believe me, building your own deck can be so much fun. Saving for the cards, crafting them, assembling the deck and testing it out vs random meta slaves and what not actually feels satisfying (when you win of course, lol).

Animated cards are awesome.
You get currency with which you can turn your normal cards into shiny, premium version ones that sometimes have cool animations.

You might think it's pay to win. To that I say no, not really. My friend bought the premium journey pass and did get a lot of good stuff but rng plays a huge role. Why? Let's just say you can get really unlucky. My luck when I open stuff sucks. A lot. Same goes for the coin toss every ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ game. So yeah, you can be extremely unlucky even if you pay for resources.

You can also grind to unlock your favorite Witcher characters. Then you get to spam their taunts. You can annoy the hell out of your opponent while waiting for them to make their move. Sometimes they'll even misplay because of it :p

Edit: This game was abandoned and left running on life support, it's been that way for years.
Also, no new content. Balance was left in the hands of tryhards and incompetent individuals as well as streamers, which is a huge turn off for me personally and I cannot recommend the game in its current state. It just.. kind of died, slowly but surely. And it's too far gone by now, sadly :(

I got the game as a gift, and well... it's a gem. Pretty overwhelming at first but given how there is a proper tutorial and everything is designed to actually help you, you can't get lost.

Little by little I started learning and I'm gonna be honest, I'm having tons of fun.
There's a looot to do and I mean a lot. Vast open world, many characters/classes to pick from, many quests to go on, much to do and all that. Overall a great game!

Edit: I no longer recommend this. Had to go through multiple websites and create more than a few accounts over the years just to be able to launch the game, and all for naught. I still can't properly link everything to my Steam. It's insanely annoying, so I give up.

I also hear the anticheat is like malware of sorts that does not go away even after an uninstall, so I'd rather be safe than sorry. There are many other games like Black Desert out there that don't need you to go out of your way and waste time on their websites or require third party software to play, so yeah hard pass for me, adios!