Recent reviews by Party Magician

West of Loathing was an absolute gem, and ever since I finished it (and then finished it again, and then again on hard mode, and then...) one of my biggest gaming wishes was to forget all about it just so I could experience it again.

Shadows makes that wish come as close to true as I can get without severe brain injury. Hilarious writing, tight gameplay, interesting and clever puzzles, everything is there and more. The fact that it dropped completely without warning just intensified my joy. It's brilliant through and through, and like its predecessor it's one of the few games – ever – out there that manages to be actually, consistently, funny at its core.

This DLC earns a true expansion status and harkens back to the good parts of 4 and 5's content. There's a series of 5 missions with new and interesting mechanics, fun characters and funny dialogue.

The new buildings are a bit hit-or-miss outside of the missions, but overall bring a good new dimension to the game – even if thematically the drones a bit out of place if you build them right away after getting into Modern Times. The Cargo Airport alone makes for a lot more options and possibilities of arranging your island.

The only big miss in my opinion is the new edicts. Drone-related ones are alright, even if they're a bit of a "win more" kind of deal. The Q-ult stuff and Gig Economy are basically just jokes about current events that land flat, while providing almost no gameplay benefit.

Overall this is a very solid buy and a large improvement over the previous piecemeal DLCs, providing both a series of entertaining missions and a few new ways to build and enhance your Sandbox islands.

Oh and one more thing – give me the Fertility Cannon in Sandbox. Just do it.

Better than its reputation. The writing is a bit groan-inducing at times, but not much more often than 2's. The low-G mechanics are fun to use once you're familiar with them. Definitely worth the sale price at the very least

Best underground racing story mode, NFS ain't even close

Action, Drama, Miniguns, the concepts of knockout race and minimum-speed challenge explained through bombs strapped to the cars for some reason!

Legit tho, it's still a fun game (although not without its ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥) and the track editor is still great if a little basic. My love is mostly fueled with nostalgia because I've had the original, but as a pure arcade it's not half bad, especially for the price.

I was excited for a prospect of an actually decent new Flatout, but "decent" the most you can describe it as.
It's worse than Flatout 2 and Ultimate Carnage in just about every aspect. In most it's only slightly worse, it's no Flatout 3, but "better than Flatout 3" is a hell of a low bar to clear. It feels like Flatout Lite – there is a sense that they tried to recreate the old ones, but it lacks their best and most fun aspects and moments.

The driving is, put quite simply, not fun. The crashes lack any punch. I notice an opponent in front of me spin out and get sideways, nitro into him at full speed, and for that effort I'm rewarded with a plink which the game is happy to tell me was a "great slam". It actually felt like my car slowed down before the impact, as if to avoid the collision like I was playing full-assist mode in a circuit racer.

The cars basically have three control types. All Derbies are understeering bricks, all Classics are spin-happy nitro machines, all Ultimates (or whatever the third one is) are 6x6 offroaders. None of the classes have any variety in character.

Speaking of character, the cast of 7 (FO2) / 11 (FOUC) fun and varied opponents with actually different AI parameters have been replaced with two facial models caked in various forms of makeup, who drive exactly the same. Did they honestly think we wouldn't notice? Not that FO2/UC's opponents were some kind of RPG-esque well-written characters (they had a car set, a paragraph of bio, a "photo", a color scheme and some AI parameters tweaked), but this game manages to avoid even that.

The Assault mode, which is essentially the only addition to this compared to FOUC, feels like a better fit in a kart game and has been better done in several of them.

The music, after FO2 which basically defined my tastes for next 5 years and FOUC which, while not as impactful, still added a few bands to my notice list, is uninspired and lame. Most of the songs are in the genre of what I'd only call "whine rock".

Even the graphics, which you'd think would be the one area where it's stupidly easy to improve after nine years are worse. Not from the technical standpoint, they've got the fancy reflections and godrays and whatever from the latest set, but it looks straight up worse because the environments are grey, the cars look dull, and the details are low-effort.

Worst of all, this game gets boring. The races quickly become a grind. The stunts are a snorefest. (Seriously, how do you make flinging yourself into a Beer Pong cup uninteresting?) The derby is a succession of lame-feeling hits and watching the health bar go down.

Maybe, if it was the only game in its genre, I'd be okay with it, as it has occasional cool moments and is, at the very least, competently made (as opposed to Flatout 3). But seeing as Flatout Ultimate Carnage is right nearby on Steam and ten times cheaper, there's just no point in buying this game.

Vote Carmageddon: Max Damage for Best Use of Farm Animal! I don't see a better use of farm animals than this

First impressions:

Indycar: Super fast (what did you expect), but tamer than the "European" Formulas. Straight up slays corners while keeping stuck to the tarmac. You can take it to the max, but can still lay back a little (while still going very very fast). Plus it's called "Indycar (Road Course)" in-game, which gives me hope

Fusion Stock Car: Fun to drive and fittingly heavy, but seems kind of pointless without oval tracks. It's not horrible on road courses, but it's fairly obvious that it's outside its environment (I know NASCAR has road courses, but they're not the point of it)

GT3s: I'm an admitted fanboy of Chevy race cars, so I was sold at "Corvette C7.R as GT3". It's pretty much exactly what I expected, too. Fast, jumpy, fun to drive. The Cadillac was a pleasant surprise – it feels heavier than other GT3s, but at the same time it's not too difficult to control, and has the engine to match.
Both the GT3s provide a different experience from the existing European entries, but stack up to them performance-wise, not being overpowered but not falling behind either. Plus, they're the first GT3s in this game that are neither German or British, so hooray, variety!

Overall:
8/10 muricas right now
1776/1776 muricas if they ever release ovals

V6 Megane is a great addition to the lacking Touring discipline
RS01's a sweet fast Grand Tourer, though it's a shame it's in a single-car cup class
Formulas aren't really my thing but the 3.5 is a nice alternative to FB
Road Megane is a nice expansion to Road C1, which are fun to drive despite low speed
Alpine is insane, in both good and bad senses.

Overall a really solid pack for its price, one of the better DLCs for this game

It's pretty funny and cleverly subverts some expectations, and in any case – It's free and less than half an hour long! What do you have to lose?

Mercedes CLK-LM is fantastic. I've played this DLC for several hours and I still haven't played any other cars, that's how fantastic Mercedes CLK-LM is. This is the first time I've raced the fantastic Mercedes CLK-LM (or GTR) in a game since NFS 4. Have I mentioned the Mercedes CLK-LM is in this and it's fantastic? And more diversity to the already incredibly varied GT3 is nice too, I guess.

Only problem: neither of the two new classes (GT1 and LMP900) get their own career invitationals, so this is solo+online only, at least for now.