Recent reviews by The Asbestos Express

This game is par none for depth in the fantasy strategy genre. Simply put; if you are a fantasy strategy gamer and you have not played it, you are missing out. Missing out on a lot of sleepless nights, heartache over dumb decisions, and frustration over just how you didn't know something that was so obvious just moments ago.

Out of all the popular CCGs I have played, Hearthstone, Duelyst, and this I can safely say Shadowverse is the best of the bunch. That is not just my opinion though, but what I have come to understand from many card players from a variety of different games and from various backgrounds of experience. The reasons are self-evident as soon as you log in. When I started playing on the steam release I was instantly given 40+ packs free of charge, 20 of which were from the most recent expansion. Whenever the servers go down for maintenance, or whenever there is an issue with the game or a special event the devs take the time to give free cards to all players for the inconvenience or to celebrate. Not only this but there are eight cards in each pack, and the first few packs you open are guaranteed to give you at least 4 legendaries, which you can re roll if you so desire. But besides the great generosity is the evolve mechanic which gives any minion you play charge to attack another creature on the turn it is played, and a 2/2 buff. The charge mechanic serves as a mid-game come back mechanic to aid control, combo, and aggro decks that have drawn poorly. It’s a great way of transforming the mid game into a skilled exchange of evolutions rather than just laying out card draw like in so many other games. The heroes themselves are also extremely varied, each of them has many playstyles and each has a unique mechanic. If you are at all interested in CCGs disregard the Weeb skin for one moment, and you will find an excellent compelling strategic experience.

At its best Evolve is filled with tense moments of narrowly dodged boulders, bullet and skill flinging hunters and the pressure to take on or become a growing threat. But the best does not come often in this game. Every single monster ability has such a huge AoE and quick timers that most abilities are impossible to dodge if the monster has a decent internet connection. While you can burn your jetpack to run away from the monster for a bit, prepare to get focused and constantly battered if you are playing support or medic. Most hunters are either strictly better than other hunters in their class in all circumstances, or are so awful you should never even consider them if you want to win. Weapon variety is minimal and the weapons themselves are unsatisfying, as is running around a half an hour as a monster eating wildlife. To boot they increased the prices of all store items, can you guess what they added in a recent update? A P2W currency. Now characters. monsters, perks, and even cosmetics are absurdly expensive with generated in game currency. Avoid the game, it had two chances and it won't get another.

This is the king of first person puzzlers. The mechanics are simple but multiply in complexity, and more importantly they are introduced in a way that slowly cultivates the player’s skills. The story is told in a threadbare manner that will keep you starved for clues and constantly guessing. The writing will keep you hooked in general as it is of exceptional caliber. Graphically it is impressive with a unique style; you will see many beautiful vistas in your journey. A few of the main puzzles are too simple for the time at which they are encountered in the game, but the optional puzzles at any point will really fry the brain. This is all done in an open world, in a unique setting, accompanied by the tremendous musical talent of Damjan Mravunac the composer for Serious Sam.

For the first 20 hours the game will constantly throw new weapons, perks, and characters at you. I'd be surprised if the majority of people even managed to beat it in those 20 hours too, as this game even on normal proves to be an uphill battle. After you have sampled a variety of weapons, characters and beat the game on normal as every single character you are still going to have to play on hard, endless, or in the arena in the newly added Gauntlet Mode survival game. The weapons are quite unique and varied, the combat is fast paced and very skill oriented, and the enemies will kick your ass. You will still have to deal with roguelite bs like garbage spawns and weapon drops from time to time but do not let that dissuade you; This game is great fun to explore and master throught times of both great luck and terrible misfortune.

Its terrible to see what has happened to this genre defining game in the last few years. It has gone from a bastion of creativity and market leading to succumbing to the times. Instead of quality updates the best you will get now is some bit of hat and tat every few months. The devs will also fix 'bugs' that are actually features, and refrain from balancing egregious loadouts. Its clear that the TF2 team does not even play their own game, and nor should you.