Recent reviews by Futureproof

Finally. It's glorious.

One of the most beautiful experiences I've ever had in gaming.

Single Player Hunt Showdown with Destiny gunplay with heavy catholic vibes a la Blasphemous or Lords of the Fallen. You hunt the witch, and her minions hunt you. As your power grows, so does hers. Your conflict becomes more personal as it becomes clearer that she's scrutinizing your playstyle.

Simpler than some people wanted, but the amount of content will grow over time. Here's my takeaway after only a few story missions and watching how the game was developed:

The great
-Excited, unbelievably based invested dev team.
-Incredible case for games as art. The complexity and detail in every scene is mindboggling.
-Runs very well on my 3060 with DLSS set to Quality at 1440p.
-Nailed the impact and feel of every weapon and melee attack.
-Tyranids are far more deadly than orks, if a little damage spongy in comparison.
-DOUBLE 3-player co-op campaigns that intertwine. People complain that the story is only 6-ish hours, but the Operations mode is an extension of the campaign, frequently involved in main story events. This extends that campaign by almost double, not counting enemy variation in the Operations mode.

The bad
-Some small optimization issues and crashing exists for some users. Devs are committed to fixing this.
-On higher difficulties, bots don't know how to intelligently support your actions often abandon you during objectives or stop participating because they are overwhelmed. Can be overcome with friends.
-Ranged enemies are frequent and in the Campaign with bots, they target you frequently explicitly. Having few answers to this on higher difficulties means you will absolutely melt in many situations.

I look forward to a few balancing and optimization updates and all the amazing cosmetics on their way for people to Marine Barbie.

You've lost your way, dead man.

How do I pay you more money?

The best parts of Warframe and Destiny. Missions and objectives right out of both. Satisfying gunplay, a decent level of customization, brilliant graphics.

Some early launch issues but the game has improved vastly since beta. The only possible downside I see right now is a very Korean milktoast story that you really don't need to pay attention to. One of the bad guys I've been chasing for the last 2 zones is named Jeremy. There's no better way to immasculate a villain than naming him after the only guy in my high school that couldn't get laid to save his life.

If you're tired of Warframe's too-deep systems, or Destiny's complete ineptitude at creating or monetizing anything, this is a welcome breath of fresh air.

UPDATE: 25 hours now put in, versus 12 at original review time below. All of the below is still true, I am nearing the end of the campaign and maxed out 2 characters. There is an overwhelming amount to do and farm and I am loving it. Everything I do makes some sort of progress. One additional downside, there are no safeguards in place to make sure players meet a specific gear level prior to doing group activities, including the challenging boss fights. This means that by nature of random matching, many low level, ultra-casual players who don't bother to upgrade gear or equip proper elemental resistances/damage have been passed into difficulties they have no hope of competing in without learning basics. By extension, most of my boss fight themed missions at this point are filled with players who die in one hit or are incapable of killing enemies in a specific order. To cite the Steam Achievements, less than 5% of players have upgraded any gear mod to +7, which is pretty necessary after the first few zones for self-sufficiency. This may improve over time but I'm rooting for some kind of basic, raw gear-score check for content above level 30.

UPDATE: About 70 hours in. 5 Descendants owned and plenty of viable options to chase. No money spent so far. Gunplay is still a lot of fun and I've reached a point with Ajax where I can easily face tank Level 100 Hard missions and am functionally immortal for current content with a few 200-400k DPS weapons built out. I do not feel inclined to purchase micro-transactions. The only thing preventing my progress has been my desire (or current lack thereof) to level different weapons. It would be convenient to have matchmaking for Hard Infiltration missions and some kind of qualifier for playing higher-level boss fights because the amount of people with no build, no health, no damage trying to play what is ostensibly the 'Endgame' right now is too damn high.


Final Judgement:

Great gunplay, insanely rewarding grind, more lenient wait times for research and 10 free Descendant slots. Lots of great updates on the way and consistent communication from the team.

This game is art.

I say that in the best and worst ways. In its gameplay, it was clear that the developers first stated "How can we make this look amazing?" instead of "How can we make this play great?". The gameplay is passable and at least at the level of your average Farcry experience. If you like open world games that give you hundreds of checklist items to perform and repetitive actions to mull through for hundreds of hours, you will enjoy this game.

But it will wear on you. I tend to love games like that. But seeing that around 20% of the player base gets to Act 3, where I stopped, I understand. I don't want to climb more shrines for 5 minutes at a time. I don't want to run around with foxes to find shrines. I don't want to hunt down more flags, or make haikus, or find the 80+ cosmetics scattered around. And I certainly don't want to play the game again, even for the main story content in NG+.

This art has bright, brilliant strokes that all blend together into tedium. It's an important game, one you should play, but one few will beat. Not because of difficulty, but because of repetition.

The multiplayer isn't abandoned but nobody must be playing the lower level content because I ended up with the only people ever connecting dropping off of my matches or disconnecting once they realized it was a low difficulty mission.

I ultimately begrudgingly recommend it to fans of repetitive open world experiences. I will occasionally return because when the combat is good, it's AMAZING. And very little else can re-conjure those feelings I had when first playing Bushido Blade on Playstation 1.

Some day 1 issues with quickplay, but overall an incredible experience... exactly what the devs promised with extremely fun gunplay and rewarding exploration. If you ever looked at the trailers or promos for this game and thought "Man, i wish the game actually played like that", it does. It's magical.

The way the bugs and bots chunk apart is just great.

If you liked the first game, this is an easy buy at full price. Don't worry about Super Citizen unless you know you're gonna end up wanting the deluxe war bond, or you just want to support the devs.

Some facts you didn't read because you scrolled straight to the bottom to read reviews:

-Yes, it's an Online Live Service. Stated openly and publicly. If you do not like Live Service games, do not buy this. People who left reviews complaining that this game is always online are also complaining that World of Warcraft cannot be played offline. Leave them to chew on their crayons in peace.
-Creating a steam-linked PS account is fast, easy and nearly instant.
-There is an online store using both in-game and paid currency, all items are earnable EASILY in-game. Just this morning in 4 hours I earned 650 Super Credits doing easy missions solo, and only 250 is required for an armor skin.
-There is an anti-cheat. If you like cheating, do not play this. People will complain if an anti-cheat is too weak, but their mewling about this game also proves that they will complain if an anti-cheat is too strong. Contrary to opinions you will see regarding this anti-cheat, it will not install Hitler onto your computer. You'll be fine. We are all fine in here. No need to send help.

Play this right now. Do it. Don't even hesitate. Go to the FFXIV website first, sign up and download the free trial. It's the full Base game, Heavensward, and Stormblood with almost all the content available for free. No money. It's like 600 hours of content for nothing. If you're nervous about registering, look up a video guide.

The best story in gaming. Some of the boss fights from past expansions still make me cry like an idiot. The best soundtrack in gaming. Fair, consistent gameplay and class design that doesn't feature much ability or passive ability customization, but it makes up for the lack of customization by making every class 2 miles deep. This game seriously respects your time and values you as a player, and a character in the world. Nearly all of the content from past expansions is still relevant and played.

The community at large does not tolerate toxicity and most of the games systems breed friendly helpful players. I have all classes at 90, most professions levelled, have experienced most of the content in the game currently, and continue to subscribe to visit parties at player homes, socialize and spend time in this world that means so much to me. I find reasons to replay dungeons and raids to help new players and support the community.

Here's my recommendation to help you avoid wasting your time:
-=If you're going to skip over the story content, just pass on this game.
-=If having a 2.5 second Global Cooldown for abilities is literally too long to hold your attention, just pass on this game.
-=If you want to power through the story to some illusory all-encompassing 'endgame', just pass on this game.



Come at it like it's a real full-blooded Final Fantasy game and you'll be vastly rewarded. You'll find friends both real and NPC. You will introspect. You will learn more about what in life is important to you. You will experience the most banging boss fights and soundtracks. You will become the main character in your own story, in a world that you intimately understand the machinations of. Some reading required. Illiterate and impatient people need not apply. If you find yourself bouncing off the slower, more dated A Realm Reborn content, find someone to play the game with, because even if your stories are separate, you will have someone to bounce predictions and ideas off of to keep it interesting during the slow times.