Recent reviews by mythal

Its simple. Its shallow. And its cheese AF...... but hey its a free demo you can pull your hair out on for an hour.
The whole potion spam thing is ridiculous. AI can buy potions and chug them nonstop when defending base, so you cant kill their troops unless you can focus target with ranged units and one-shot them. Otherwise, they are invincible....
How dumb. Lame attempt at ripping off warcraft lmao.
Just go play https://littlewargame.com/play/

Endless

nearly 20 years later - and im still waiting for someone to make a pirate/sailing game as good as this one....
..... still waiting....

The expansion itself was pretty decent - but not for $30.
This should have been a $15 expansion.
The bad part of this expansion of course is that NW is a PVP game at its core - and this expansion only dragged the game further away from actual PVP endgame.
AGS simply dont care about this game and the fact that there are less than 10k players left globally now shows the result.
NW is a dead game, the reason is very simple: braindead game designers who dont understand their own game.
It really is a huge pity. NW has amazong "bones" - but the gameworld is dead because nothing is built for players to actually do anything with those bones. Its a dead world of repetition focusing on mindless PVE now - when the core of the game and what attracted most players to the game was PVP aspect - and all we got was the most frustrating and time-consuming 30 minute PVP action (which took 4 hours+ to organize).
AGS could have done a hundred different things with this game to make actual endgame content, and they havent done anything with it.
Its like having a ferrari - without the engine. Feels good to sit in and imagine being able to drive it, while waiting for the mechanics to finish building the engine which never comes.... so we sit in the beautiful car and hope one day we can drive it.... but we never will.
Thats NW.

I usually save my reviews for games that deserve it (for good or bad!).
This game 100% deserves a great review.

If you are an ARPG fan then this is a game you CANNOT miss. I have played every major ARPG (and many indie/minor) for 30 years. These devs have too - and they have learned what makes a great ARPG.
POE is undoubtedly the king of endgame/hardcore ARPGs but this game is finding itself a niche somewhere in the middle-ground - it is easy to learn for the more casual players and still offers a literal endless depth to the endgame content for us hardcore end-game min-maxers (literally! you can push endgame as far as your characters can handle it!).

+ Itemization in this game is done better than any other ARPG I've ever seen. Every item that drops can be useful.
+ Crafting system in this game is better than any other ARPG I've ever seen. Forget about full RNG POE crafting - this mixes RNG and situational crafting so that you can both roll the chance dice but also be absolutely sure what you are crafting towards.
+ Target farming is done very well in this game, also better than any other ARPG: you know exactly where you can find the uniques that make your build, and push endgame corruption to raise your chances of getting them.
+ Combat system is rewarding, fluid, and awesome.
+ Class building system is simple and yet very complex allowing dozens of different build options for every single class. Skill combinations, and the ability to use uniques to change skill behavior makes even more customizability.
+ World and lore is an actual fresh take on an ARPG that not only provides an EXCELLENT play-through campaign, but ties into the end-game seamlessly.

- NET code on this game needs big improvements: lots of disconnects, long loading times for zones, and really buggy group play. This is literally the only bug/issue I've had in the game in over 200+ hours though and I'm writing this review pre-v1.0 launch so lets hope theyve fixed that!

I'm downvoting because unfortunately steam doesnt let us give a "neutral" review - and if I have to chose between yes or no? It has to be no.
The game itself is however not a bad _start_ to a product that I'd be happy to buy in the future.
In_its_current_state however, its really not a polished product, not a real game as of yet.

Aside from issues like inventory being incredibly small (and therefore very limiting) which many players have already mentioned; and the movement system being clunky and needing WASD support (that works, mind you); and so on - I could list more things, but the point is that if you want a GAME to PLAY for $15 right now, then you wont get that with this. Yet. Hopefully.

I dont give upvotes on games that arent worth an upvate _in_their_current_state_ - because early access is abused as a cashgrab by the _majority_ of EA titles on steam - and since the developer of this game has only released one game __which_failed__ - then going on their track record you cant really be serious if you give them an upvote until they've proven they can successfully deliver.

I am however very hopeful that they finish this! I like where its going! I hope that their past failure serves as _lessons_learned_ and not a _repeat_of_failure_ - I think we all do! I'll be refunding this for now because I dont want to reward for work not finished, but will gladly check it out again sooner hopefully than later!

1998: counter-strike
2014: insurgency
2018: insurgency 2
thats all ya need to know....

I think it reveals just how shallow, empty minded, bad at gaming, and immature the writ-large "gaming" customer base is today, by how popular this game is.

This game is nothing more than some flashy (way too flashy) graphics psychologically intended to blind and dazzle the most feeble minded children.
It is nothing more than sexist and racist asian stereotypes (east asians are some of the most sexist and racist people in the world, if you didnt know...).
It is nothing more than constant-gratification-reward cycles, pinging your screen with rewards to make you "feel good"....
Talk to an NPC? **YOURE AWESOME! HAVE A REWARD**
Flip a lever? **AMAZING!!! HAVE A LOOTBOX!!**

The combat is fluid, but mediocre at best. It is also the easiest combat of any ARPG I've played in the last decade...

The story? OHMAIGAWD! I had to vomit 3 times in the first 15 minutes listening to the insanely childish copy/paste narration (did they literally hire schizophrenics to voice-act this??? sounds like it...). There is no story. There is no lore. This game is as deep as a puddle...

Truly a game built and designed for less capable people.

You are not a GAMER if you "play" stuff like this.
You know what you are, and so do we GAMERS.

I'll leave this little gem of a nugget here for you from another real gamer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKWZGpoik5I

Yet another customer that has been SCAMMED by their misleading sale listing of the UPGRADE.
Yes its a scam. It is not at all clear what you are buying and is priced and packaged to pretend that its a full Blackwood + All DLC upgrade to your existing account.
The entire page description states only that "this includes all previous DLC".
There is no page description for the upgrade.
Customers are deliberately led to believe that the upgrade also includes all previous DLC.
The pricing also matches exactly what such an upgrade would cost (Blackwood Upgrade = Blackwood Full Game minus price of ESO Base game).
This is actually how US law works. This entire page is a literal textbook case of misleading deliberate false advertising and consumer fraud. We should be looking into a class action on Zenimax for this obvious behavior.

TL;DR: This is a great MMORPG to sink your teeth and time into and both will go deep.

Pros:
+ PVP: Openworld PVP, Events PVP, GVG Wars, Battlegrounds...
+ PVE: Interesting and functional NPC/monster world system that makes sense.
+ Engaging gameplay from level 1. This is a game you enjoy right away, no need to "get to level X to start playing"
+ Combat system
+ One of the most beautiful (graphics + audio) MMO's I've played. Ever.
+ Exploration
+ Friends, "Company", Community
+ Corruption invasion system and the lore behind it: its unique, its functional, its engaging.
+ Quests: Almost all quests are fully voiced, and although they are simple/repetitive, lots of the main/side quests are interesting stories. You should read them and not just "fast click" through them...

Cons:
- PVP: In alpha it was full loot, perma PVP. I was actually hoping it would stay that way. I am a hardcore MMORPG PVPer (Shadowbane, DAOC, UO, ...)
- PVP: Openworld PVP is fun but not enough people are "flagged". Too many wow kiddie carebears who have never played a PVP game before.
- Combat system: Its good, but a little clunky. Slow responsiveness. Wish I could "animation cancel" moves and such...but this is a small gripe.
- PVE: This isnt really a PVE game, so it is lacking "depth" in PVE - though I expect a lot more work and expansions which will expand PVE since they turned away from being a full PVP game.
- Quests: Aside from the main, side, and unique quests (lvl 20 weapons etc) - all the other quests are very repetitive.

Conclusion:
If you want a beautiful immersive experience that is best played with friends (its easy to find a company to join and participate); engaging from level 1 where you dont need to grind to any specific level to fully enjoy everything the game offers; a rewarding endgame PVP game of politics, wars, and more....then get this game now!