Recent reviews by Tantalus

TL;DR - The best Heroes installment since the third one. Amazing graphics, suprisingly good story and a great price to gameplay value, but it comes with the horrible Ubisoft DRM system (UPLAY) that forces you to be always online. Campaign offers about 120h of gametime with core game and additional 60-70h with all available DLC (Pirates, Dance Macabre, Shades of Darkness).

PRO's
+ Overall gameplay improvement - Although I played Heroes V for some time and recall some improvements implemented before, the overall gameplay overhaul in Heroes VI is, for me, its greatest advantage. All the flaws of the Heroes III (which I am very fond of) are fixed and remade into intersting mechanics. I could name many examples, but I will focus on the two selected, the first being the Town Portal mechanics. In H3 all you ever wanted from your Hero was to have Earth Magic on Advanced level and a single Town with Town Portal spell to learn. If you could get it, you practically won the game, as you could jump around the world to collect your units and utilize a devastating mobility advantage. In H6 all units from given faction can be purchased in a single Town, provided it has all the necessary dwellings so there is no need to jump from town to town to accumulate the army. As for the mobility advantage, Town Portal is no longer a spell you have to learn - its a building you can create in any of your castles. Level 1 Town Portal allows a visiting hero to teleport to any other town or fort of his choosing and Level 2 Town Portal allows any here to teleport back to the city (nearest with L2 Town Portal) from any place on the map. As you can use only one of those spells on a single turn, Town Portal becomes a commodity and a feature of its own. The second noteworthy feature is the complete revamp of unit tiers. In the past units were categorized by 7 tiers, first one being the cheap weaklings and the last one being an all-powerful destroyer. Now you got pretty similar units but reworked into 3 tiers: Core (three first units), Elite (the next three) and Champion (the old Tier 7). All Core units are comparable in their usefulness and so are the Elites, but they got their traits that would work best for certain heroes (as the rule of a thumb, there is a Might unit, a Magic unit and a shooter in both Core and Elite tier). This makes creating your army more flexible and greatly increase the basic unit performance in comparison with Champions. Unit reclassification was the real gamechanger and a very welcome one.
+ Astonishing graphics - The environment is pretty amazing, especially in the campaign maps. The world is filled with random magical objects or unique decorations that really help to maintain the magical character of the world of Ashan. It is also very well optimizes for older graphic cards. Unit design is top notch and campaign posters (images seen when loading a campaign map) are simply fantastics.
+ Interesting storyline - The world of Heroes has always been ridiculous and over-the-top with its magical theme, but I think this is the first time the main story actually embraced it and used it so effectively. The dialogues form a suprisingly coherent narrative for the main plot, which might not be written that greatly, but sure as hell is well voice-acted. I was very positively suprised how well contrived the world of Ashan is in the dialogues, so the story has its value whatsoever.
+ Lots of playtime - The game, even without DLC, provides you with a very decent amount of content to go through. Core game has 22 campaign missions, clocking at about 5h each, so you can easily go over 100h just enjoying the single player mode. DLC add another 14 missions (2 in Pirates, 2 in Dance Macabre and 8 in Shades of Darkness, so the two adventure packs ain't worth the price), with similar amount of gameplay within. And of course the multiplayer, especially the couch one, can provide you with another Infinity hours of gameplay. If you buy the Gold or Complete edition on sale, the price to value ratio is pretty damn good.
+ Very heroes-y music - Lots of the tunes are remakes of the H3 score and everything else really complements the graphic design. Soundtrack is what you would expect from a Heroes game, but thats a good thing!


CON's
- UPLAY - Ubisoft bloody DRM will turn the game off when the Internet is down (less often) or UPLAY servers are unresponsive (very often). It also forces itself into the game in the form of CONFLUX orbs - something similar to chatrooms, placed near boss battle locations. Their Mission/Reward system is stupid and the whole software is simply annoying as all hell. Still, its not Origin, so I guess it could have been worse.
- No hexgrid (again) - Why did the developers of Heroes decided to go from classy hexgrid battle to obviously inferior square tiles? I know it was the same with H5, but why? Hexgrid is million times better!
- Some balancing issues - Although units on their own are very well balanced when comparing factions, the Hero bonuses are not. Faction powers of Haven and Necropolis are far better then those of Sanctuary or Stronghold. Blood/Tear bonuses also vary from totally worthless to grossly overpowered.
- Gets kinda repetitive - After few missions and some skill experimenting, the game gets pretty easy and repetitive. Reinforcement skill almost break the game, as it allows you to go through most minor battles without a single lost unit. You don't have to change your tactic that much to win with different enemies.


Overall, I recommend this game very stronly. Unless you hate UPLAY more then I did or you want to play this game competitively againts your friends, you gonna love H6 if there is any affection for turn-based strategies in your heart. Is it better then H5? HELL YES! Is it better then H3? Arguably yes, but even those that treasure H3 as the best game ever will say that H6 holds the solid second place on the HoM&M podium.

TL;DR - Its the most mediocre game I ever played. Not really worth a negative review, but I have only two options to choose from. Designed for xbox360 controller, so I recommend using it. If for some reason you decide to play this game, please use the game wiki extensively (if you don't want to lose 60% of sidequests), try not to increase your Battle Rank to fast and skip all dialogue if possible - the plot is horrible. Game offers about 80-120h of playtime.

PRO's:
+ Amazing graphics - Stunning background environment, very detailed character and item design. Every weapon in this game looks like the ultimate weapon in some other RPG.
+ Unique battle mode - You control up to 5 groups of heroes that you can recruit from special guild or meet during your journey. Each group of heroes permorm a single action, moving on a battle field. Groups of characters and enemies can intercept one-another while they attack or gang up on one group to finish it off quicker. Its a very clever idea for a turn-based combat system.
+ Lots of sidequests - There are many different things to do, lots of guild missions, sidequests and hidden bossfights. You can take a break from main plot and gather some plants for potions or minerals for weapons in a spare time.
+ Lots of characters - You meet many characters, most of them with their unique backstory and special quests. You can use a lot of them at the same time (up to 20) and you got a big group of people to choose from.
+ Decent music - Nice, hard beat during fighs and chilled tunes in dungeons, works great with those pretty backgrounds.

CON's
- Almost unplayable without a guide - there is a nice The Last Remnant wiki out there and if you want to play this game, you better add it to your bookmarks. The game offers no explanation of some of its vital mechanics (like party formations or Battle Rank) and you might become confused easily (especially because some of the mechanics doesn't work as intended or don't work at all). Whats worse is that all sidequests have cut-off points in the main plot - you can do them only if you stop your main plot progress before unspecified point and look for them. You can't leave a quest you find to finish it off, because there might be nothing to get back to.
- Main plot is awful - Rush is the blandest character in jRPG since Tidus and Sora, a cartboard-cutout without a single unique trait. His sister is a run-of-the-mill damsel in distress and all other primary characters have a personality of a typical Micheal Bay movie protagonist. The main plot is terrible, offers little to no payoff, its clear that it was cut and rewritten numerous times during the game development. If you are in it for the story, you gonna be disappointed.
- Team orders are randomized at each turn - you can't choose freely what to do with each character or even a group of characters. In each turn you pick one of the several semi-randomized orders you can give at this time. You may find that your team of healers won't have a healing order in some turn or you won't be able to use magic on specified stack of monsters.
- You can't equip items on characters other than Rush - weapons, armors, accessories - you can change them freely on Rush, but no other character. If you got a powerful weapon in your inventory, some characters may ask you if they could equip it (they probably won't though). They will however ask you to give them some raw materials for upgrading their own weapons and gear, as well as your opinion on what they should focus on - magic or physical attacks. It barely does anything so you have very little say in what you characters are using in battle.
- Havok engine - enjoy your wacky ragdolls :)

SUMMARY
Its worse than you might hope, but better than you fear. Its really the most mediocre thing I've played. As a fan of SaGa series (its from the same devs) I enjoyed some of its mechanics, battles are unique, graphics are amazing and I had fun playing it from time to time. However, its obvious the game was developed in a hurry - it got so much wasted potential that its really heartbreaking.

TL;DR - Not really a game, got more in common with those weird, interactive movies they used to make on VHS. Amusing story-wise, impressive graphics (for a source-engine game), good music. About 1-2 hours of "gameplay".

PROTIP: After finishing the game, use "sv_cheats 1 --> noclip" for additional 30 minutes of fun-time :)..

Played it along with my girlfriend and it kinda spooked her at times. Graphics are trully astonishing for a source-engine game, music fits well and can make you feel uncanny at a time. Story is suprisingly deep, although I wouldn't say its really "semi-randomised" (some dialogues interchange between gameplays, but thats it). But, for all its worth, its not really a game, more like a semi-interactive movie. You can move your character and thats it - no monster to kill, no items to interact with, not even a jump-button. You walk around for an hour or two, look at the scenery and listening to the main character inner voice. I don't recommend it as a game, but I recommend it as a visual, maybe even intelectual experience - how boring it might seem at first, the "game" as a whole is definitely worth its price.

TL;DR - Twilight Zone the Game. Good story, nice characters, decent music and graphics, poor, overly simplified gameplay mechanics. About 15-20 hours of playtime.

I really enjoyed playing the game. Its got very nice narrative and a very good overall story, that skillfully mixes mystery/thriller theme with funny moments. The game starts with a quote from Stephen King, which is very appropriate, because Alan Wake is feels kinda Stephen-King'ish. Gameplay mechanics are very simple, but not entirely unenjoyable - fights force you to alternate between flashlight and handgun, while avoiding hits, you got few QTE thrown here and there, and a handful of collectibles to find. However, this is not a game you play for button-mashing, there are no skill trees, no level ups or epic gears - its very much story-driven game and washed-down mechanics are apparently the fee you must pay for a good character-developement and storytelling these days.