Recent reviews by MonolithTMA

Bought this today and played it on stream. It was a big hit!

I've been saying since the OG Demon's Souls that I wanted an open world Souls game and I finally got it. I've had tons of fun in this game. I'd love to see them combine what they have accomplished here with survival elements next.

I've been playing GW2 since long before it came to Steam. It's a fun game with tons of content. Play at your own speed, solo or with friends. The core game is soloable with a decent amount of challenge. The Living World and Expansion content definitely raises the difficulty, but is doable solo. GW2 is a game that I always come back to.

I'm having just as much fun in FH5 as I did in 3 and 4. Gorgeous scenery. Fun cars. Fun races to unlock progression. Every time I finish exploring the map in these games I always wish it could go on forever. If they were to make a Forza Horizon with an endless procedurally generated map I would be in heaven.

My favorite Resident Evil since 4.

I loved Resident Evil 1-4 and played a lot of each of them. 5 and 6 were entertaining but never really clicked for me. I played through 7 on PS4 and recently played it again on PC. I have a love/hate relationship with 7. I found the story intriguing, but I am not a fan of the "naked and afraid" style survival/survival horror games. I like to start with at least a gun and few bullets. I did like it more on my second playthrough and really enjoyed the story.

Admittedly, RE Village starts you out the same way, but you do get a gun fairly early, and ammo seems plentiful enough.

One story element that I enjoyed in 7 and again in 8 is the family aspect. A protagonist trying to protect their family gives more emotional weight to the story, at least for me.

While I was not a big fan of the shooter style of 5 and 6 and preferred the slower pace of the previous games, RE Village seemed to me to be more of a hybrid of the two styles, though the shooter aspect and relentless enemies could be annoying at times.

The game looks fantastic, and I found the environments to be very immersive. One thing Resident Evil has always done well is environmental details. From Resident Evil 1 to today, the environments feel like real locations with wonderful detail. I also had no real performance issues on my system, which is an i5 with 16GB of RAM and a GTX 1070.

While I enjoyed the voice acting, I wish the characters in this European village had European accents.

This is the first Resident Evil since 4 that I wanted to play again right away. I highly recommend it to any Resident Evil fan.

The most important thing I can tell you is, "Watch the credits at the end of the game."

I'm not a fan of survival games; the whole naked and afraid and punching trees with your fists never appealed to me. That said, for some reason, Valheim intrigued me enough to put it on my wishlist. A friend started playing it and gifted the game to another friend and me, and we started playing on his server. At the time of me writing this review, I have 182.5 hours played.

Sure, you start nearly naked, and I was a little uneasy, but the game guides you through the first steps, and soon enough, I had made a hammer and a stone axe, and I was chopping down trees and building basic structures. Then I began crafting rudimentary armor, and the various nighttime enemies became a little less scary. Once I met the requirement and could craft a pickaxe, I began to mine copper and tin and on and on. I’ve paid it forward and gifted the game to two other friends who had it on their wishlists. I’ve also started my own server.

Obviously, having played the game for 182.6 hours in two weeks and two days, I am having a blast. I mean, I’m having such a good time that I could easily see myself playing this forever. R.I.P. to my unplayed games.

The astounding thing to me is that a developer team made this great game of five people. This is an Early Access done right.

Things I like:

How easy it is to get started.
The graphics are pretty basic, but lighting and other effects really make up for it, so the game is gorgeous.
The music is really well done and very peaceful.
Building stuff is fun.
Sailing. The sailing music is my favorite; that French Horn kicks in, and I just melt.
The combat works really well, I thought I would miss being able to lock onto enemies like a Souls game, but once I figured it out, the combat became tons of fun.
The price. None of that No Man’s Sky $60 dollar pricing here; $19.99 is just right, especially considering the quality of the product.


Things that are meh:

I don’t like the way the whole server levels up. I’m nowhere near ready to enter some of the biomes, but others have, so some high-level stuff can attack my base, and I don’t have the gear yet to deal with some of them.
I’m sure this will be fixed, but the game could really use some optimization. My friends and I have it running pretty well, but it could be better.
Flying enemies. This is just personal preference, but I hate flashing back to Morrowind’s Cliff Racers.
I hate that I need to sleep in real life; I’d rather just play Valheim 24/7. 😏

TLDR: I hate survival games but absolutely love Valheim.

Ok, so I finally got around to playing this and I really enjoyed it for the most part.

Pros:

Story: While not incredibly original I still enjoyed the story. I won't spoil it but even though we've seen this type of story before it was well done.

Environments: The environments were appropriately atmospheric and downright creepy at times.

Combat: The combat felt good. The weapons felt like they should. Big weapons feel heavy and smaller weapons feel light and fast.

Level Interconnectivity: One of the things Dark Souls 1 is praised for is its level interconnectivity and The Surge has that in spades.

Enemies: The enemies were fun to fight and some were pretty challenging.

Cons:

Level Interconnectivity: I haven't spent this much time wandering around a level or levels trying to figure out where to go since Turok 2: Seeds of Evil on the N64. The first couple of shortcuts I found were exciting and then it seemed like every time I was finding something new it turned out to be a way back to the current hub. This was useful but also confusing, especially if you put the game down for a while and come back to it wondering which way to go. Also, this game could really use a map.

Enemies: Some of them can one-shot you regardless of how much health you have, at least until you get some upgrades later. Combine that with the confusing levels and you spend a lot of time just figuring out where you died. The first time a mostly normal looking enemy killed me I thought it was a glitch, then I thought maybe he had knocked me into some part of the environment that was killing me. Still, the combat is fun but frustrating at times.

Communication: NPC "I need you to go to a place." Me "Great! Where is this..." NPC: "I need you to go to a place." Seriously, please give me a little guidance as to where this place is.

Overall it is a good game and I am looking forward to playing the sequel.

Fantastic game. I mean, I'm probably going to need therapy after playing it but it was most excellent! Creepy atmosphere, great music and voice acting. I admit, I did play it on the easier mode but it was still terrifying and rather thought provoking.

A fun soulslike with an anime look. The combat is tight and the character creation is good.

A fine end to the series.