Recent reviews by fgrfreakon

On the cover, it's seems like HZ1Z... the body however, a very different game. 1st game - Parachute, land, get punched to death within 10 secs. I'm now on about 10 - 15 games and I just managed 7th on Solo, so there is hope! Don't let frustrations get the better of you and just persist and learn. IMO, I love this game, it entertains me, which is what a game should do. It's the first game in a long time that has given me a route to success without linear paths and achievements or trophies. It is not without it's flaws, but as with early access it is to be expected and to be fair, I have yet to come across any bugs! Love it or hate, it's going to make money, it's going to gather momentum on popular streaming sites and it will be everywhere.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/578080/

I have been with these guys since FPSC, and thoroughly enjoyed the simplistic casual approach to game making.

Game Guru offers a great starting point, with a substantial amount of assets to start creating in seconds!

They have an intuative UI with easy to use Terrain and Entity editors, as well as a character editor to get NPCs into your game idea.

There is no pressure to learn coding, however to really take advantage of the software you would need to look at learning LUA the script language, but it is straight forward and there is plenty of guidance in the game files as well as on the forums.

You should not expect to thump out AAA games on this beastie, but this is a good platform to get your ideas out and see them in action.

You either love it or you hate it. IMO I love it, I accept the delays and bugs as part of the EA. I admit to being frustrated at the start, I couldn't log in on launch and had to wait until the next day for access, but was determined to not let that put me off the chance to experience the game. My 1st few toons died quickly of starvation, I simply didn't know how to survive in this game. I then discovered berries, which allowed me to sustain my health to jump from town to town in search of better sustenance, this increased my life span considerable and I am now running a character for a good few hours. I was lucky enough to find an axe which allowed me to chop trees, from there it was all up hill, planks and sticks, rags and soon I had a bow and arrows, now able to hunt and craft. The discovery system allowed me to create Berry water which helped for longer treks. Some patience is required for this game, EA means we are missing a lot of key features still to be implemented, but all in all it is enjoyable enough for now to keep me interested unable a more stable release. Although this is in the same genre as DayZ and ISS, I find it stands alone in the mechanics of the game and still has it's own unique appeal.

So far, my time in the game I have not experienced any negatives as a result of the 'P2W' that seems to grip, even those who haven't played the game, or have no intention of playing. I will not 'P2W' personally, but it has not yet had an impact on my ability to enjoy the game.

This game still needs a lot of work, and will patches will continue to flow, so far the Devs seem to listen to the community, which can only be a good thing. Fingers crossed they are regular and plentiful.

Personal, I'm sitting around 7/10 on this, with a view to change pending further development patches and/or release.

Again, You either love it or you hate it, but I would encourage people to try it for themselves, and allow time for discovery before throwing the towel in, and you are certainly entitled to your own opinion, but criticism should be constructive, subjective and relevant.

Good luck survivors! See you in the field.

Links:
http://store.steampowered.com/app/295110/

/Review DayZ Standalone.
DayZ is an intense, emersive survival game, set in a massive 225km Squared map of Chernarus, partly fact and partly fictictious Russian state. The Aim of the game is simple, Survive. The application of the Aim however can be, often, heart breaking.

/Starting out
You start alone, from a random spawn point on the map, with a torch and battery, T-shirt, pants and shoes. In order to continue surviving from this point, you will need to explore, loot and avoid. Exploration takes a simple form of following roads or streams, coastlines or rail tracks. All of which will take you too and through the many towns of Chernarus. Here you can search buildings and houses to start building your inventory.

/Inventory
Your inventory takes the form of a grid like screen showing different areas of your body, from Head to toe! You can find hats from Cowboy to boonie. Sunglasses, gas masks, clown masks (From Payday) and bandana's which can be used on your head or face! Hoodies, coats and T-shirts, combat pants, jeans, shoes and boots. Most importantly a backpack, each item from body, legs and backpack have a limited amount of slots to fill with whatever you deem important enough to carry with you. Food and Water.

/Crafting
There are various introductory items you can craft to aid your survival, from an improvised backpack to a splint for your leg should it get broken (and it will). You can tear T-shirts into rags to use as bandages. You can craft a fireplace to cook and keep warm, along side this there are hunting aspects to kill, skin and get meat.

/Combat
There are essentially 2 types of combat, Guns and melee. Melee combat is at best, sketchy, hard and clunky. Still a lot of work to be done here. Melee includes your fists, hatchets, spades, pitchforks and crowbars. Guns are a bit more stable, and the usual choice of killing tool. Handguns, rifles and machine guns all have there part to play, it's really down to you. Most weapons have a scope available along with the standard iron sights, but again this is down to availability and personal preference.

/Zombies
Zombies are meant to be the be all and an end of the game, but in-fact they cause the least resistance to your ability to survive. This is not a fair representative however, as the in the game as it stands are just place holders while the good work is being done in the background.

/Summary
The only way to summarise this review is by explaining I put 100+ hours in the Mod before the Standalone release, and I'm well on my way to getting past the 100hrs mark again. The game is incredible, flawed and great with bleamishes yet to be ironed out. Well worth the money and time.

/Thanks
Thanks to Dean Hall for the idea behind DayZ, Thanks to Bohemia Interactive for the initial Arma II game which allowed the Mod to develop, Thanks to Steam for providing a gaming client, Thanks to my SO for being a gamer too

/Links
http://dayz.com/

http://store.steampowered.com/app/221100/

I played this in Alpha Alpha, and it was blocky and chunky, this latest Alpha release is smooth and well constructed! Great gameplay, good atmosphere, good mechanics well worth a look if you haven't already had your fill of Zombies, apocalypse or survival!

So the 1st Achievement I unlocked was "Die 20 times"... This game pretty much translates as '16 bit Dark Souls'

Surprising game, I remember when it first came out there wasn't much hype with it, but now I've played, completed and got 100% Achievements, it kinda makes me feel like I really did like it!

This game pure wrecks my face

I feel the title of this game is almost completely accurate other than they give you guns to prevent the 'Dead' part.

If there is ever a post apocalyptic survival event, I'm well prepared, Fallout will one day prove to be the best training.