Recent reviews by Til mit der Brill'

This review is divided into two sections:

1. A Review of the game
   
2. An Upgrade-Guide: Should you upgrade if you already own the original game?

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[If you are too lazy to read all of my thoughts: TLDR at the bottom]

The world, story and characters

The beautiful post-apocalyptic world of Death Stranding, based on photogrammetry-assets captured in Iceland, invites you to explore. The theme of “Connecting and feeling connected” is at the center of Death Strandings story about loneliness, family, loss and hope. The game manages to hold a healthy balance between “serious”, “deeply philosophical”, “funny” and “emotional”, that worked out for me very well! If you can’t stand overexposure, some cheesy puns here and there and lengthy cutscenes (basically the Kojima-way of storytelling), then you might feel turned off by the game’s narrative at first. The well written characters, with their deeply emotional backstories have grown to my heart after a while and I always wanted to know what’s next! Also, the cast (full of Kojimas friends and people you might know) does a great job at delivering the story through their motioncapture performances and dialogue deliveries! The cinematography of the cutscenes is also one of the best in the industry!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2647400508

The story is one I still think about long after having finished the game and that’s quite a rare thing! The soundtrack and licensed music selection is also amazing and fit the atmosphere at any given moment! Seriously, there are quite some bangers in here!

The gameplay: Can traversal as a core gameplay mechanic be fun? (Yes!!)
Death Stranding is a unique game. You might have watched some gameplay on “YouTube” and thought “Well that’s just a walking mailman! Boring!”. These thoughts are based on your mental model on how this “walking” feels in other games where you just press “W” / “LS forward” to traverse any terrain with ease. Death Stranding takes the element of traversal and makes that the one of the core elements of the game: Being aware of how terrain around you, planning smart routes and using the right equipment to traverse the roughest areas of the game get quite addicting after a while. You got to keep your balance, use the tools that you can craft, like ladders, climbing ropes and more. Getting over every hill, mountain and river feels like an achievement!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2640126860

Delivering is what you do in Death Stranding (and the only thing you for for 99% of the time)! If you expect a fast-paced action game, this is not the right game for you! There is some combat against the mules and the B.T.s, which is quite fun. Especially the Bola gun is enjoyable to use! You can also avoid most encounters with B.T.s (the black slime-thingies) by using the radar that is powered by your B.B. (that baby in the orange-juice glass).

The game takes its time to suck you into its world. Playing Death Stranding is more like an experience, than playing just a game: It feels therapeutic, meditative… Finishing each delivery is satisfying! That’s only the case, if you know that this is a slow-paced game, that many people might classify as “tedious” for focusing on the traversal aspect!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2787422892

Feeling connected with other players

The asynchronous multiplayer-elements are what makes the game very special in my eyes: While working on your deliveries and exploring the world, you gain the trust of certain people, which unlocks the ability to build structures in the area around the properties of these people to make your routes through the landscape easier. Basically, you connect knot after knot. Connecting the different knots, unlocks the ability to see the structures of other players like Ziplines, bridges or shelters and use them to your advantage and help others by upgrading them.

You can also see some of the routes others took, use the vehicles someone left, upgrade and repair structures or place signs that inform other players about upcoming dangers, restore stamina or mark enemy territories. You can also upvote all the things other people build, which gives them a notification. Kojima described the goal of the game as followed:

Originally posted by Hideo Kojima:

"After spending dozens of hours in the game you will come back to reality in the end. When you do, I want you to use what you learned in the game. Connecting is one of those things." ( Death Stranding: Inside Kojima Productions | Newsbeat Documentaries - YouTube )

The theme of “connection” plays a major role during gameplay and it feels so rewarding receiving all the positive feedback from all the players, so Kojima definitely hit the tooth with the drill there and made me feel less lonely for the time while playing the game!
https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2650966924

All in all, I played Death Stranding for over 100h and completed all the achievements and do not regret it at all. The unique and deep story, the beautiful world and the innovative gameplay made it really special in my eyes! Death Stranding was a great escape from reality and sucked me into its world with ease!
Keep on Keeping on!

Summary (TLDR)

Originally posted by TLDR:

• A must-buy, if you are into slow-paced games!
  
• If you expect a combat focused, fast-paced game, do not buy the game! This is not for you!
  
• Beautiful world & soundtrack
  
• Playing the game is a therapeutic, meditative experience
  
• Well directed and deeply philosophical story with a great cast of characters
  
• Death Stranding reinvents the traversal gameplay
  
• Asynchronous multiplayer-elements help to convey theme of “connection”

The driectors cut adds some new helpful tools, vehicles and customization options, a few missions and other QoL-improvements giving you more ways to complete orders.
There is also a quite frustrating car-race-mode which seems a bit out of place, but it adds some nice new music-pieces!

Recommendations:

1. "I am half way through the original game." → Be cautious! The save transfer will mess up your existing Zipline-Network´: The structures from other players in your world do not transfer and some of your structures don't transfer aswell,
   when the geometry of the landscape changed. It could be quite frustrating to rebuild some parts of your network!
   
2. "I own the original game, but didn't start or play a lot yet (not over Chapter 7 yet)" → The upgrade would enhance your existing experience. That's the case where the upgrade adds the most value!
   
3. "I already finished the original game once and plan to replay it" → Same case as the one above!
   
4. "I already finished the original game once and don't plan to replay it" → Only worth it if you are an achievement hunter! All achievements transfer, just not the ones that require to craft the new stuff!

TLDR at the bottom

"Ohh boiii, Im your dad! I have to raise you now!"

In God of War you step into the shoes of Kratos the... well...the God of War. The game is loosely inspired by Norse mythology. Kratos and his son Atreus (not Andreas) start their journey to fulfill the last wish of Kratos' dead wife & Atreus' mother: Spreading her ashes at the highest peak of the nine realms. During that journey Kratos faces the task to raise his son, which actually isn't as easy as killing everything that moves.

The dynamic between the grumpy, mostly seemingly cold Kratos and Atreus, who wants to prove that he is as brave and a worthy son is well executed. Christopher Judge and Sunny Suljic deliver a great and emotional performance. All the characters are well fleshed out and their motives are always clear and get proper character development over the duration of the game. Without spoiling anything, I can say that the story is a truly heartfelt one, that's worth the purchase alone!

"Boiiii, I teach you how to fight! It will be fun!"

While God of War (2018) is a way more cinematic experience than its predecessors, the combat system is well fleshed out and engaging: Each enemy type requires a different approach to expose their weaknesses. Kratos can use his equipped weapon to chain combos and use special attacks. You are also able to switch between different combat styles (fists, axe).

The combat ties well into the general gameplay loop, that consists of exploring the "semi-linear-open world" of Midgard and its different realms: The chests you open often require you to solve some sort of riddles, puzzles or tasks. New special light and heavy attack moves are often the reward, motivating you to also explore the areas of the game that are not tied to the main story! Having good equipment is also the key to beat the challenging bosses that might await you!

"Oh boiii, I see trees of green, Red roses too, grey mountains bloom...!"

The artistic execution of this game still holds up perfectly, even four years after the initial release of the game: The realms feature varied landscapes and atmospheric biomes that are a sight to behold! The PC version scales higher than the Playstations "Original"-preset. The character models and general animation quality also did not age a single bit. Exploring the world was one of the most fun things I experienced during my second playthrough after all those years!

"Ohh boiii, I got an eargasm!...oh wait you are too young for that, right!"

An important aspect in games, that should not be undervalued is the audio experience: Gladly God of War nails it. There are options to fine tune the audio mix (tip: give the music a bit more dominance!). The ambient sounds, and effect sounds deliver a rich and immersive atmosphere...and the dude who made the soundtrack is called "Bear"...obviously it is perfection then!

TLDR at the bottom
The soup..the game got cooked with love and care!
In my opinion MARVEL Guardians of the galaxy offers the best version of the guardians to date. During the story you get to know each guardian, while learning about their past trauma. The themes of "Healing" and "Hope" play a huge part in the narrative. The humor you would expect from a Guardians of the Galaxy-experience is also smashed into the cooking pot, really well! Eidos Montréal nailed the balance between all of those ingredients, that contribute to a story that you feel invested in! You also get to choose between dialogue options, which will trigger some "Telltale-like" pop-ups informing you, that the choices you made, will have some impact later in the game. Some characters may like or dislike you during the game here and there, depending on the choices you made! Being able to talk to your crew on the Milano (your ship) adds to the feeling that this is a journey, that you take a part in, releasing some "Mass Effect Lite"-vibes (which is agood thing!).

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2709062501

It just feels right!
While playing the game you can feel care and love to detail the team put into this game! You just feel happy and emotionally invested for the whole duration. The game is like a very long, well-paced, playable Marvel movie with all the spectacle you would expect: You meet many (new interpretations) of Marvel characters. Each actor does a great performance. The facial-mocap quality and emotional range the cast delivers are of the highest standard!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2716086604

Raspberry-Pie for your eye!
The visuals looks absolutely stunning, you visit many unique and very beautiful planets and places. All the environments add a lot of variety to the experience. For example, you start your journey in the Quarantine zone, A place that contains the remains of the galactic war. The broken shipwrecks are held together by some beautiful looking pink "popcorn-goo" during another mission you travel to a cyberpunk-like city. There are lots of planets and each one is rich. full of details and little side areas to explore! ...What I am trying to say: If you like bright colors, fancy landscapes and visual variety and are in general a graphics fetishist, you will get aroused for sure.

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2695129645

Overall great gameplay, but: Starlord-Only
The game is well paced: Switching between exploration, light puzzles and combat-sections. Sadly you only play as Starlord during this game, while being able to use unlockable abilities of your allies to attack the different weaknesses of your enemies (basically a bit like Mass Effect again). The combat is definetly the weakest part of the game, but still very enjoyable. If you are a fan of spectecular boss-fights, this game will deliver you that! The light puzzle elements, exploration and also some space battles are a true joy! I got never bored playing the game.

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2713785169

Eargasms that will never gonna give you up!
Sound and music make up half of the experience of a game, in my opinion. Most of us associate Peter Quill with his walkman and his love for music form the 80s. That is exactly what you get! The selection of licensed music is huge! You got all the bangers you expect to be there. The sound effects during the gameplay are also well implemented and believable. All underlined by a great soundtrack which delivers a theme that will be stuck in your head! A perfect audio-mix!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2717957135

Originally posted by TLDR:

Eidos Montréal delivered an awesome Guardians of the Galaxy game and in my opinion, the best interpretation of these characters to date! The pacing is perfect, every section of the game is enjoyable. The dialogue, delivery of the well written story and the beautiful locations are of the highest quality! This is a must play if you every enjoyed a Marvel movie or you just want a "no-♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥" enjoyable linear story-driven and well paced linear action game!

What is the game about?

LEGO® Builder's journey is little puzzle game that lets you solve puzzles by using the danish clamping blocks in creative ways.
While solving the puzzles the game uses these levels to tell a cute little story about a parent and a child that get separated. Even without any form of dialogue or text, the game manages to get its point across using animations, which is quite an achievement in my eyes!

The core-gameplay

The learning curve is well realized: LEGO® Builders Journey keeps adding new mechanics to keep the gameplay fresh and engaging! Each level features a different, atmospherically well realized setting. By placing blocks you try to traverse through each are, while solving riddles that require using the clamping blocks in unique ways.

The beautiful visuals

The game really looks amazing when you enable the fully Raytraced graphics powered by Unitys "HDRP"-rendering path on steroids: Realistic reflections, Ambient Occlusion and shadows bring the game to life with well authored physically based materials for the bricks, that even show some imperfections like scratches. As someone who gets quite aroused by beautiful photorealistic graphics (and all the tech behind that), this game is a must buy!

But don't worry, even if you have a low end system you can run the game just fine, while still maintaining its core look without Raytracing.

The relaxing sound

The sound effects are also fitting and add to the atmosphere. Also the game features a "LoFi"-Soundtrack that adds to the really relaxing and soul-calming experience! (A worthy candidate to the "I can't fall asleep, pls I need to sleep now!"-playlist)

TLDR
The 2-3 hours I spent with this game were definitely worth it! It kinda felt like an ASMR-game! Get this in a sale, if you think it is too short for this price. I hope we will see more games from this studio in the future!

[If you are too lazy to read all of my thoughts: TLDR at the bottom]

The world, story and characters

The beautiful post-apocalyptic world of Death Stranding, based on photogrammetry-assets captured in Iceland, invites you to explore. The theme of “Connecting and feeling connected” is at the center of Death Strandings story about loneliness, family, loss and hope. The game manages to hold a healthy balance between “serious”, “deeply philosophical”, “funny” and “emotional”, that worked out for me very well! If you can’t stand overexposure, some cheesy puns here and there and lengthy cutscenes (basically the Kojima-way of storytelling), then you might feel turned off by the game’s narrative at first. The well written characters, with their deeply emotional backstories have grown to my heart after a while and I always wanted to know what’s next! Also, the cast (full of Kojimas friends and people you might know) does a great job at delivering the story through their motioncapture performances and dialogue deliveries! The cinematography of the cutscenes is also one of the best in the industry!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2647400508

The story is one I still think about long after having finished the game and that’s quite a rare thing! The soundtrack and licensed music selection is also amazing and fit the atmosphere at any given moment! Seriously, there are quite some bangers in here!

The gameplay: Can traversal as a core gameplay mechanic be fun? (Yes!!)
Death Stranding is a unique game. You might have watched some gameplay on “YouTube” and thought “Well that’s just a walking mailman! Boring!”. These thoughts are based on your mental model on how this “walking” feels in other games where you just press “W” / “LS forward” to traverse any terrain with ease. Death Stranding takes the element of traversal and makes that the one of the core elements of the game: Being aware of how terrain around you, planning smart routes and using the right equipment to traverse the roughest areas of the game get quite addicting after a while. You got to keep your balance, use the tools that you can craft, like ladders, climbing ropes and more. Getting over every hill, mountain and river feels like an achievement!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2640126860

Delivering is what you do in Death Stranding (and the only thing you for for 99% of the time)! If you expect a fast-paced action game, this is not the right game for you! There is some combat against the mules and the B.T.s, which is quite fun. Especially the Bola gun is enjoyable to use! You can also avoid most encounters with B.T.s (the black slime-thingies) by using the radar that is powered by your B.B. (that baby in the orange-juice glass).

The game takes its time to suck you into its world. Playing Death Stranding is more like an experience, than playing just a game: It feels therapeutic, meditative… Finishing each delivery is satisfying! That’s only the case, if you know that this is a slow-paced game, that many people might classify as “tedious” for focusing on the traversal aspect!

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2648289659

Feeling connected with other players

The asynchronous multiplayer-elements are what makes the game very special in my eyes: While working on your deliveries and exploring the world, you gain the trust of certain people, which unlocks the ability to build structures in the area around the properties of these people to make your routes through the landscape easier. Basically, you connect knot after knot. Connecting the different knots, unlocks the ability to see the structures of other players like Ziplines, bridges or shelters and use them to your advantage and help others by upgrading them.

You can also see some of the routes others took, use the vehicles someone left, upgrade and repair structures or place signs that inform other players about upcoming dangers, restore stamina or mark enemy territories. You can also upvote all the things other people build, which gives them a notification. Kojima described the goal of the game as followed:

Originally posted by Hideo Kojima:

"After spending dozens of hours in the game you will come back to reality in the end. When you do, I want you to use what you learned in the game. Connecting is one of those things." ( Death Stranding: Inside Kojima Productions | Newsbeat Documentaries - YouTube )

The theme of “connection” plays a major role during gameplay and it feels so rewarding receiving all the positive feedback from all the players, so Kojima definitely hit the tooth with the drill there and made me feel less lonely for the time while playing the game!
https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2650966924

All in all, I played Death Stranding for over 100h and completed all the achievements and do not regret it at all. The unique and deep story, the beautiful world and the innovative gameplay made it really special in my eyes! Death Stranding was a great escape from reality and sucked me into its world with ease!
Keep on Keeping on!

Originally posted by TLDR:

• A must-buy, if you are into slow-paced games!
  
• If you expect a combat focused, fast-paced game, do not buy the game! This is not for you!
  
• Beautiful world & soundtrack
  
• Playing the game is a therapeutic, meditative experience
  
• Well directed and deeply philosophical story with a great cast of characters
  
• Death Stranding reinvents the traversal gameplay
  
• Asynchronous multiplayer-elements help to convey theme of “connection”

The World…breathtaking on the surface

Let’s start with the world and the visuals. The graphics are generally breathtaking (definitely comparable to the red gummy bears!). On the surface Night City is a sight to behold. Especially the raytraced lighting really shines with all the neon lights everywhere, giving the city a realistic eyegasmic look.
The illusion of a breathing, living world falls apart though, if you look too closely.

The “inhabitants” of Night City feel like bland robots, walking from A to B no matter what, with no brain. The spawn system randomizes the look certain body parts and then spawns these creatures into the world. Sadly, this system does not check if it spawns an NPC-instance more than once in the same area. Occasionally, the same pink-haired meatbags spawn in hordes in a radius of 25 meters... A quote of Star Wars: Episode II: Attack of the Clones describes that phenomenon really well: “200,000 units are ready, with a million more well on the way.”.

There are some interesting, big buildings, that you would love to explore from the inside, but in nearly all cases you will be greeted with the typical “X – Closed”- UI hint, when you walk towards any door.

The Main Story and Side Quests…Interesting and well executed

The Main Story is awesome and is the reason that made me keep playing Cyberpunk until the end. Some characters are just hilariously bad and bland (-> “Adam Smasher”) and some parts of the main storyline were obviously cut out, especially in the first Act of the game (-> Jacky).
The main aspects, regarding the impact of technical modification of the human body in the near future, the resulting consequences and the question of what it means to be “alive” and “human” are well handled. First, I did not care about Johnny at all, and thought he was quite annoying shouting his “Anti Corpo”-propaganda into the ears of my V every five minutes. However, progressing through the story more and more, he grew on me. Keanu Reeves was a worthy investment.

Some of the side quests also tell unique and interesting stories that add value to the overall experience and tone of the game. Depending on which quests you did and partially, which decisions you made, there are a few different endings, that range from “okay” to “Damn, that was actually quite nice”.

The “Open World busywork” … the disgusting, bad tasting gummy bears

Like most Open World games nowadays, Cyberpunk also falls into the category of games, that attempt to artificially blow-up the playtime by adding meaningless, repetitive “content” to the game. The so called “gigs” and “NCPD”-hustles are sprinkled over the map, like too much salt on fries. These activities always follow the same few patterns: “Kill all people and collect a Gucci back, that is laying around there” and “Go into that building, free that guy… oh and by the way, that closed door, never mind it! There is an open window if you look 90 degrees to your left or right”. This type of content adds nothing to the experience of the game and feels like those weird liquorice bats added to the gummy bear boxes (for people who like those ones: //insert gummy bears that you hate …You kind of do not want to have them, but you bought them with the whole package.

The Game Mechanics

The gunplay feels generally solid, there is a lot of variety of ranged weaponry. The Stealth gameplay also works quite well, with its quick-hack mechanics and can be fun at times. The melee combat on the other hand feels bland to jokingly bad and consists of the same two to three, clunky animations chained together repeatedly. The dismemberment looks quite satisfying though!

The skill tree consists mostly of entries that provide passive stat-manipulations with no real impact on gameplay. To be honest that part of the game could have been cut out completely and I wouldn’t have noticed it at all! The Cybernetics are fun to use and change the way to play the game. There is a lot of variety offered and trying out new combinations and modifications is adding a lot to the gameplay experience! Especially the “bullet-time-like”-feature and the arm projectile launcher are a joy!

The Audio experience…a mixed bag

Audio-wise this game is a mixed bag and suffers from several issues. Sometimes music or ambient sounds randomly disappear abruptly or are missing their fade out-effects. Certain audio-effects are often playing at a way too high or low volume depending on the distance of the player. Those issues are occurring way too often, sadly. The bugs and issues regarding the mixing and spatial audio were the ones, that broke the immersion for me the most in this game.

The soundtrack enhances the atmosphere and fits the game perfectly! There are some so called “bangers” in there, as the eloquent kids of the modern world would say! A few more combat tracks would have been nice. The same few action tracks repeat a bit too often for my taste. But in general, great music and the sound effects are also good, just the mixing is totally messed up.

The bugs…from mutated funny gummy bears to the super hard ones, that you cannot chew and swallow at all…

Besides the annoying aforementioned audio issues, there are a handful of other bugs, regarding the pathfinding of the AI and some animation issues that can break immersion. Those can be quite funny at the same time though. Each player will experience a different number of bugs, maybe some are even lucky and do not encounter ones at all, I encountered many. Besides some T-Posing while driving a car, NPCs walking in the air or godlike, flying traffic lights, that could be mostly ignored, there are also some bugs that negatively impacted the experience.

An Issue, where UI elements did not turn on/off after entering/leaving a vehicle occurred way more often than I would have liked. At one point a dialogue/interaction option that already got triggered, stayed in the dialogue-options and could be triggered again, teleporting me to a position where I have been a few moments ago and blocking the progression of the quest. Most of these issues could be resolved by loading a recent checkpoint, but those bugs negatively impacted the fun I had with the game. All the bugs are a testament of a game, that needed way time in the oven. More than one additional year for sure.

(TLDR at the end... just read a bit, you lazy person!)
Recommendation: If you haven’t played the first game, you should play that one first!

In the sequel to “Ori and the Blind Forest”, Ori’s journey continues, facing new enemies, meeting new friends and allies. The story that Moon Studios is telling is heartwarming. If you played the first game you should know by now that by purchasing this game, you will have to go the extra mile and invest in some safety-tissues! Jokes asides (well it wasn’t really a joke)
After having played through the game three times, Ori and The Will of the Wisps is one of my personal favorite games. Ori’s second adventure takes the foundation of what made the first game so special and revolutionizes the formular and expands in scale, size, and quality in all aspects.

First of all, there is the new fighting system. Fighting in “The Blind Forest” was fun, but the aspect that got overhauled the most for this game. Ori can now choose between different weapons that handle fundamentally different: From a Sword, bow and spear to a hammer. Each one requires a different playstyle during combat and has its advantages and disadvantages against the huge enemy variety. Passive skills in form of shards, can be found and many new abilities get unlocked the further you get into the game. The controls are snappy, Ori always does what you expect him to do and when you die, you never feel like it is the games’ fault. Whatever you do, the input translated into the character-movement perfectly.

In Will of the Wisps, Ori’s story continues right where the previous game ended. Without spoiling anything, the themes of friendship, family and love play a big role. On the way Ori meets many new friends in different areas, each featuring a unique biome that also adds new gameplay twists and puzzle elements to the gameplay-mix. The general flow of the game is well executed, the pacing and difficulty scaling always felt well balanced…and yes: the escape sequences also make a comeback! bossfights and these well-known Escape sequences test your acquired skillset while never being unfair. You will die a lot, but overcoming each challenge feels super satisfying! (No need for tissues here!...except you are a pervert)
The platforming feels as great as ever. The traversal through the different areas always feels satisfying and the level design itself features lots of variety and different gameplay-mechanics.

All of that is supported by exceptional graphics powered by Moonity (MoonStudios modified Unity engine, check out the DigitalFoundry Interview to see how it works in action!). The superb lighting system, the beautifully handcrafted art assets, the physically based “squash and stretch” animations and lots of tiny details make each rendered look like a painting!
When we talk about Ori, we cannot forget to talk about the exceptional soundtrack. Gareth Coker elevates Ori’s emotional journey with a fitting heartwarming, intense soundtrack for each part of the game. Ori’s theme from the original game gets some fresh takes, getting woven together with new themes. Each new character and environment get treated musically with a thematic approach. The soundtrack strikes the right amount of “Damn ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, I’m back!”-nostalgia feeling and “that new piece sounds quite sick!” that you would want for a sequel! …Seriously, the game is worth it for the music alone already!

Alles klar! Hier eine kurze, neutrale Beschreibung: In "State of Mind" von Deadalic Entertainment schlüpfen wir in die Haut von Richard & Adam in den 2040er Jahren. Ziel des Spiels ist es eine dystopische Geschichte mit besonderem Fokus auf Transhumanismus, Separation und Wiedervereinigung. Hauptgameplay-Elemente sind dabei die Gesprächsführung in Dialogform und simple Puzzles.


Die Kurzantwort: Falls du jemand bist, der auf dystopischen Sci-Fi-Kram steht: Ja!

Das Storytelling und die Dialoge sind gut geschrieben und ich wollte zu jedem Zeitpunkt wissen, wie es weiter geht. Der LowPoly-Artstyle ist sehr ansehnlich. Zwar, wirken ein paar Close-Ups auf die Gesichter ab und an etwas leblos, das Berlin der 2040er Jahre und City 05 sind allerdings glaubhaft gestaltet worden: Von den futuristischen Appartments, hin zu den Straßen mit autonomen Fahrzeugen... jede Location verfügt über viele Details (wie zB. Poster in den Straßen), die zum Erkunden anregen und einem das Gefühl geben dass es sich um eine glaubhafte Repräsentation der nahen Zukunft handelt.

Das vorhin angesprochene Problem mit den emotionslosen Gesichtern wird durch sehr kompetente stets Synchronsprecher begraben: Die Vertonung ist durch das ganze Spiel hin erstklassig. Hinzu kommt ein immersiver Soundtrack mit einem immer wiederkehrendem Leitmotiv.

"State of Mind" verfolgt das Ziel seine Geschichte glaubhaft rüberzubringen und das schafft das Spiel, trotz des ab und an sichtbar niedrigen Budgets solide und für Liebhaber dystopischer-SciFi-Kost ist das Spiel echt einen Blick wert! Das Spiel erfindet zwar das Rad nicht neu, aber alleine dass ich das Teil bei einem riesigen Backlog an Spielen, bei dem ich auch mal das ein oder andere AAA-Spiel nach einer Weile zur Seite lege, durchgespielt habe, spricht für ein gutes Spiel!

Spielzeit nach einmal Durchspielen: 11h (man Ziehe davon 2h Pipi- & Esspausen ab!

In Slime Rancher you take the role of Beatrix LeBeau (I bet someone came up with that name at a nightly pee-break) who moves far away from earth to earn her money by ranching little colorful, like wobbly Bonbons looking balls.


"Slime Rancher" consists of three main game mechanics: Exploration, expanding and maintaining your ressources and slimes & researching new gadgets to get those tasks done more easily!
You start your first day at your (still empty) ranch... Equipped with a big vacuum cleaner you now start sucking up the little slimes and hoard them in "corrals"; what a nice little euphemism for "cages". Those corals can now be upgraded with special extensions, that help to keep your new little friends happy and safe inside their new homes. You can put different slime types in one corral, but not all slimes come along with each other as you might expect just by looking at their adorable faces. Each time you feed a slime they develop the natural need to free themselves after a while from the processed food.
http://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1194607761
Their poo in form of "plorts" can be sold to earn money, but if a slime finds a plort from another slime race it will just eat it and voilá... you created a mixture of the two slime races! Those slimes then change their size and look and experimenting which combinations are the most pleasing looking or profitable ones can be a blast!
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But be cautious: Some slimes want to be free again and will do everything they can to escape their new corrals... so alway buy them toys, feed them regulary and upgrade their corrals depending on their unique needs! Some combos can even end up into some really evil mutations that try to destroy your farm, infecting other slimes to do the same! The only way to get rid of those "tarrs" is shooting water at them.. and then they are gone forever!
Let's talk about Slime tech a bit now: After some days you will be introduced into the research of new gadgets, upgrades and tools to gather new ressources (e.g. with pumps that you can place in the landscape) or tools to open tresure boxes that contain blueprints for more slime tech or decorations for your farm. Those gadgets make your life as a rancher easier, add more variety to the gameplayloop and help to personalize your farm...


Jep it is indeed! The more you progress in the game, you explore more areas with unique biomes - each area has its own theme, slimes, architecture and music. Exploring the map calms you down a lot after a busy day, if you are stressed out often this is the perfect way to relax and forget the bad things in life for a while - in this game you get a full load of happyness spreaded all over your mind. The pleasing artstyle, combined with mood-enhancing environmental sounds, neat animations and an ambient, perfectly fitting soundtrack by Harry Mack result in one of the most calming gaming experiences I had in years!...
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Yup, exactly!!! You might think I overuse the words "caliming" and "relaxing", but those word describe my experience with Slime Rancher the best! I cannot recommend this game enough and the developers at "Monomi Park" add new content for free regularry, so you always got something new to discover!

Okay, so we all know that Telltale can tell great stories and as time passed after the sucess of their take on "The Walking Dead", they got their hands on sucessfully on other franchises aswell, Like The Wolf Among Us and Borderlands (be sure to play that one!).


The short answer is: Yes! Now you ask me: "Why?" ...seems my fingers get some sports this evening...Okay, I really went into this game with the feeling that telltale might get a bit cocky throwing out so many games in a little time span... although most of them have been really impressive (like I said in the first part), I really feared that they might fail at some point... but they did not... the complete opposite was the case: They brought some fresh air into the characters that some of us already know for centuries (not me, I am still too fresh).

Sooo, let's get to the audio-visual part first, before I talk about the story!
The Telltale artstyle really fits Batman and Gotham really looks authentic... thanks to the (long overdue) upgrade of Telltales inhouse engine... Here and there are little bugs, but nothing gamebreaking or longlasting! The voice actors fit as well and are authentic, like you would expect and from a musical perspective I really liked the theme that reoccured a few times through the five Episodes.

It starts with their design, already in the first episode you see that Telltale got their own take on them, they introduce everyone dramaturgicaly well and show the braveness to ignore the old stories of them that we already heard like 23821 times in all the other movies, games etc. As a consequence the story really keeps the player interested... Each eveining I finished an Episode and went to bed wanting to know what happens next... and remember... i went into this game not expecting too much. None of the Episodes felt like a filler... each one had a great pace, some really hard to make decisions... moments where I thought untill the little timer nearly exceeded before pressing the button to open Mr Waynes mouth!

All in all I can really just recommend playing this game... it doesn't matter if you are a Batman- or Telltalefan, or just like well told stories!...No one can say no to being the Batman at least once in a lifetime!