Recent reviews by FalseRecord

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Just to give this review some perspective, I've been playing the various iterations of Civ for a very, very long time. I remember playing the original like it was yesterday. Beavis and Butthead on the TV, Nirvana on the radio, and me on my Packard Bell. I spent hours in my mom's basement, wasting away from rickets while the normal kids were soaking up the sunlight, going out on dates, playing sports, and leading generally normal, productive lives. Civ 1 really messed up my life...but in a completely awesome way.

I mean, I couldn't get enough. Doubly so with Civ 2. The things you could do with that game. It had...personality. I remember little stuff, like the different architectural styles, that gave the game such an immersive quality. I remember how every time I played, the world had its own story, and how things would seem to take on a life of their own. The endless war with the Mongols, my alliance with the Germans, butting heads with Caesar. I learned more about history there than I ever did in school. It was fantastic. I didn't even play to win most of the time. I was a fifteen year-old kid in a sandbox.

I got older, and Civ grew with me. I spend endless hours on 3 and 4, balancing game commitments and my real life. When Civ 5 was announced, I didn't hesitate. I bought it immediately.

In short, it didn't take me long before I realized that this new Civ was nothing like the Civ of old. I've never played Revolutions, but I've heard there is a lot of overlap. I don't know. What I do know is that this game is boring. Really, really boring. Never have I clicked the "next turn" button like I have here. Maybe it's because it takes forever to build anything...so long, in fact, that it's easier just to hoard gold and buy things. Maybe it's because expansion and/or conquest isn't really encouraged. The seemingly massive happiness hit just makes it unreasonable. So I sit there, just watching the world slowly go by.

And how slow it is...the loading screen between turns has become my nemesis. I've turned the "superb" graphics down to their lowest setting, just to speed things up, and to keep things from jumping from one side of the world to the other every time I scroll my mouse. Just to be clear, I have a computer that can run all the latest shooters, yet cannot run a turn-based strategy game aimed at a mass audience.

The AI is dumb and unfinished. If my dog had fingers, he could win on prince at least. I don't consider myself the smartest strategist, but I have never lost a war in Civ 5. Ever. I started on warlord, then prince, then king. Onward and upward I went, until I quickly realized that the AI wasn't getting smarter. It was just cheating. This was acceptable 15 years ago, not now.

Why is Gandhi determined to kill me? After 2000 years of good relations, he wants to kill me. Not a biggie, mind you, because all he does is park archers next to my swordsmen, where I can promptly slaughter them. After I defeat his army (without taking any cities), he offers me all of his resources, all of his gold, and all of his cities (except for his capital, of course). He just gives up. I take him up on his offer, because I am obviously smarter than him. But that means my happiness tanks, my production stops, and my steady income stream is now in the red. Whatever. I still have 3 swordsmen and 2 archers. I can conquer the world with that. Screw culture.

Did I mention the music? Man, it's boring. No more period specific soundtrack, tribal or classical. Just the turn-based equivalent of elevator music. I'm sure the graphics are the bees-knees, but with me playing on the lowest graphics setting, I will never know. City-states, which were made out to be a big deal, are not. They ask for stuff, you give it to them (or not). They give you stuff (or not). That is the extent of the city-state strategy. Boring.

Actually, the city-state thing reminds me of a problem I have that extends beyond the poor quality of this game. Professional reviews. Why did every professional game review outlet give Civ 5 high marks. 9/10. A+. Really? Every review I've seen has been the same. "It has hexes!" "It has city-states!" "One unit per tile!" "Ranged combat!" "Beautiful graphics!" I even saw reviews gushing over how cool the opening sequence was (you know, the one you can't skip).

For one, I am tired of seeing the old man in the hut every time I load up. I find it oddly fishy that no "professional" reviewer has brought up the bugginess; the fact that you need an internet connection; the fact that you need Steam; the fact that the AI stinks; etc, etc, etc. Just hexes and city-states. Either they were told to write a good review by the "powers that be," or they spent a total of 3 hours playing before writing their reviews. Either way, I will never trust a professional review source ever again.

I gave this game 2 stars, because I believe it still has the potential to be good. After a few expansions, some mods, a Rhys and Fall, a Fall From Heaven. Yeah, it could be good. I've played around 60 hours, and still see a spark of genius here. But it will take an awful lot of work. Right now, it's like watching paint dry.

Back in April Paradox Interactive released Elven Legacy, the follow-up to Fantasy Wars. In my review, I praised the turn-based battle system and story, but criticized the difficulty and creeping sense of sameness, and eventually concluded by advising gamers to ‘Try It’ for the main game. Since then I have replayed it a bit here and there, and my fondness for the game has grown – it is still difficult, still not as good as King’s Bounty: The Legend, and I would still rate it as a ‘Try It’. After its release, Paradox Interactive announced that they would expand Elven Legacy with a trilogy of $9.99 DLC modules rather than a single huge expansion. It is an interesting concept, and I’ve enjoyed the first two, so let’s see how they did with the last add-on, Magic!

A comment about the reviews for these add-ons: because they are specialized and limited DLC that pertains directly to the main Elven Legacy game, I will not spend too much time rehashing the core game in terms of how it works and plays and what it looks like. If you are interested in those things head back to my original review of the game. What I will do is address the changes the add-on makes to the core game, and also the elements of the add-on itself.

As the last add-on, Magic naturally deals with the final chapters in the story. The end of the Siege expansion opened up a wave of demonic energy that is sweeping the land and having a terrible impact on the world and is driving the Arcane Masters insane. The Holy Inquisition intervenes in order to stop the spread of darkness and madness.

Elven Legacy: Magic features a single campaign with 15 missions focused around a single hero class: the mage. The focus is around a single new hero: the Archmage supreme Alfred Brennock. There are also two returning heroes, so that you once again have three playable heroes. But the real story here is Brennock, who gets armed with some powerful new skills, spells and runes.

The game really caters to those who love playing a mage – the game introduces powerful new spells and summons that are also nicely complemented with stunning visual effects that are truly massive in scope. The scope of the world is every bit as huge as in Siege, as you are trying to save the entire world from sweeping forces of darkness.

Elven Legacy: Magic unsurprisingly continues the trend of not having any voice acting. At this point it is no big deal, and remains a fair trade-off to get such a large expansion with such a breadth of content for such a great price. The graphics and controls remain largely untouched from Siege. Once again, this add-on depicts some truly epic battles that nearly stress the engine to its breaking point, but again I found that it was more satisfying than frustrating.

The difficulty level of Siege was punishing, and with Magic we see that the lull in difficulty in Ranger was a momentary lapse, never to be seen again. If you haven’t discovered it by now, it is really important to do as well as possible in missions, which typically means repeating them for better results. However, for many folks (certainly for someone like me who likes strategy games but is no grognard!) it often means repeating missions just to survive and THEN repeating more to get the Gold victory!

More than ever, getting those Gold victories will reward you in the end. The completist in me just wanted every possible mission, but what I got in the end was a bonus mission that tied together everything from the series going all the way back to Fantasy Wars! What a great way to end the series!

That said, Elven Legacy: Magic changes nothing about the things that will make you love or hate the series. It is a great value, but really depends on you having played the original game and both add-ons, and benefits even more if you also played Fantasy Wars. Like the previous expansions, if you already enjoy the original game you’ll love this third and final add-on too!
Pros:
+ Solid turn-based combat system
+ Great value for the price
+ Decreased difficulty
+ Decent story
+ Solid graphics
+ Possibility to win … but still lose

Cons:
- No voice acting
- Poor translations cause occasional confusion
- Time limits can STILL be frustrating

Game Info:
Platform: PC
Publisher: Paradox Interactive
Developer: 1C:Ino-Co
Release Date: 12/1/09
Genre: Turn-Based Strategy
ESRB Rating: Teen
Players: 1-4

One thing the first-person shooter genre has been tending towards in the last few years is an emphasis on gritty, realistic (or at least semi-realistic) gunplay. This is not a universally-loved proposition. Take a look at two screenshots from two different shooters, and chances are that if you aren't already an avid fan of the genre, you will not be able to tell them apart. The status quo is rather displeasing - but who better to shake it up than Valve Software, who have already revitalized the genre twice with the 1998 hit Half-Life and its 2004 sequel? Their effort to this end is Team Fortress 2, and what a terrific game it is.

In spite of its title, Team Fortress 2 is in fact the third iteration in the Team Fortress series, which is known for being the first class-based multiplayer first-person shooter. When it was announced way back in 1999, Team Fortress 2 was supposed to have a highly realistic art direction, but along the way that decision was dropped in favour of a highly stylized art direction. The result is that TF2 looks like no other first person shooter on the market today. Valve has used some clever shading techniques to make both the characters and environments look like cartoon characters, with exaggerated anatomy, bright colours and incredible facial animation.

The audio is similarly inspired. While weapon and impact noises are as good as you would expect them to be, what really shines is the speech and music. The game has a consistent musical theme, and jingles that wouldn't sound out of place in a '60s spy thriller play at the start and end of each round. The characters themselves emote with gusto. Each character has three different unique taunts, and several context-sensitive voice clips that can be triggered at the push of a key. While they fulfil the obvious need for a way of communicating with your teammates, they also help to create what is perhaps the first multiplayer shooter in a long time with actual personality. Whether it's the Demoman's angry Scottish rants, the Medic's odd battle cry of "OKTOBERFEST!" or the Pyro's incoherent muffled yelling, the characters' oddball personalities really grow on you.

Aesthetics aren't everything, so it's a good thing that Valve is on the ball when it comes to gameplay as well. As noted earlier in this review, Team Fortress 2 is primarily a multiplayer game, much like Unreal Tournament and its ilk. Unlike those games, though, the focus here is on teams of players competing against each other to complete specific objectives on a variety of maps. These objectives can include stealing intelligence from the enemy team's base (this game's version of Capture The Flag) or capturing all the control points on a given map. There are several variations on the latter game type, each of which has its own subtleties. The most interesting game type is territorial control, which plays out as a series of smaller battles in a larger battle to control all the areas on a map. There's a lot of variety to be had here; the only possible complaint is that the game ships with only six multiplayer maps from the get-go (with two more available as free downloadable content), but this being a first-person shooter on the PC, there are already numerous high-quality user-made maps making the rounds, thanks to the free Source SDK and Hammer map editor released by Valve.

TF2 wouldn't be much of a Team Fortress game without its classes, and while each of the classes from TFC has made a return, they've all been changed quite drastically. Where TFC had more homogeneity with its classes (particularly with regard to weapon and grenade use) TF2 goes in the opposite direction, offering nine distinct classes with decidedly unique abilities. For instance, the Scout has low hit points, but is the fastest of all the classes, making him the ideal intelligence carrier or point capturer. On the other hand, the Heavy is slow, but can take significant punishment and deal out massive damage with his minigun, and is thus suited for major offensive pushes. The Medic is primarily a support class with poor offensive abilities, but he can also impart a ten-second invulnerability charge at intervals that can really serve to turn the tide of the match in his team's favour. And then there's the calculating, cerebral experience that is the Spy class. No two classes can really be played alike, assuring that even if you manage to master one class, the others are waiting to offer you a completely different gameplay experience every time you log on.

TF2 also implements some interesting features that may be a first for a first-person shooter. In an attempt to get people to keep playing, the game keeps track of your statistics for each round. If a certain player kills you several times, that player is marked out as your nemesis, and you get bonus points for getting revenge on him. Similarly you can dominate players on the other team by killing them repeatedly. In addition, the game uses these stats to reinforce the sense that you're getting better as you play, pointing out little achievements from the previous round, like new records for maximum kills in a single spawn, time spent alive and so on. It's a nice trick to keep players interested in their own progress and keep them playing. However, the most curious of the new features is the critical hit system - critical hits are randomly awarded to players on each team, and the chance of getting a critical hit depends on various factors, such as how well you're playing or what weapon you're using. It's an interesting twist, one not usually seen in FPSes, and it's rare enough not to be gamebreaking.

As far as the multiplayer experience goes, TF2 is the first game to benefit from the enhancements to Valve's Steam content delivery service. This means the inclusion of things like achievements, a unified friends list that lets you join your friends' games with a single click, stat tracking and a robust server browser. The multiplayer experience is of a very high standard, and the game is eminently playable even when your ping starts to scrape the low 200s. Full in-game voice chat support is also included, and is crucial if you want to work effectively with your team to win games. The robustness of the online service ensures that more often than not, your TF2 experience will be unhindered by network hiccups.

All in all, Team Fortress 2 is a great multiplayer first-person shooter that will be fondly remembered by many for years to come. It's rare that a game with such a long development cycle turns out to be such a well-polished and high quality affair, so players would do well to savour what this game has to offer. Personality, gameplay, balance - TF2 has it all, and is a must-play for any fan of the genre (and maybe even for those who aren't).

NB: I've reviewed the PC version here. As a personal note, I strongly recommend that anyone with an interest in this title pick up the PC version, either through Steam, by purchasing the Orange Box, or the new standalone retail version that comes out this week. The console versions simply do not match up, in that they don't have most of the new content that has arrived on the PC version, and lack the ability to take advantage of the excellent community-generated content.

This is amazing gameplay is great and keeps you on the edge of your seat one of the best open world snadbox games ever.

dis game b gud 4 da ♥♥♥♥♥♥

i recomend this very good for people not looking to spend alot
i bought this on sale for 13 dollars but dont spend 30$ for that you can get fraps which in my opion is a little better