Recent reviews by Ghostfacial

EDIT: For the idiots who go read reviews about the spyware that keeps running on your PC. Maybe do some research instead of following the herd mentality of copy-pasting this in your own review. I'm a network security engineer and validated the communications and behaviour of this anti-cheat on my device. The hoax that this service keeps running after closing the game was a bug in the earlier days of the game and has been completely fixed. I have validated this behaviour myself. 'AntiCheatExpert Service' stops running 5 seconds after the game is exited. As far as I follow, this was a bug which was quickly resolved by the developer team.
The other big thing people complain about claims the anti-cheat to not be uninstalled, is also just a bug which was addressed by the developers, and I assume soon will be fixed if it hasn't been. (I also assume you won't even take the time to change your review claiming so after it has been fixed for a month).
Other false claim is that it would make communications to Chinese servers, stealing all of your data, I have validated all connections the anti-cheat agent establishes, and guess what. The backend is a suspected Microsoft cloud service hosted in the USA (Can still be China owned, but anyway it debunks the claims). And developers have disclosed very transparently which data is being sent over this connection (mobo brand, model, ram, cpu, OS dist), in other words, stuff that's often times already disclosed over your browser to whichever hentai site you visit.
Kernel-level anti-cheat is these days the norm and also used by the other engines you come into contact with. So if you play valorant, same engine there as there is on Blood Hunt as both are Tencent owned.

THIS IS A EARLY ACCESS GAME. Bugs are a thing, if you're gonna write negative reviews about these. Maybe either validate the scope of security risk and application behaviour in advance, find a right source of somebody who did it for you, or retain from even playing the game or writing a negative review with 40 minutes in a free early-access game, when you can't deal with the complications of the game state.

Posting this review during its first day of early access, honestly impressed how the developers pulled off to have this game be this stable. The game is fun, the climbing, combat, different guns, different abilities. I started playing battle-royales with H1Z1 in the olden days, played PUBG, The culling (not the 2nd cash grab), a bit of fortnite, a bit of the Call of duty trainwreck. But none stuck since the OG days.

Now Blood Hunt is here, and adds something refreshing to the dried out battle-royale genre, having a fun twist with the different abilities, amazing movement. It's the first game to get me to enjoy a BR once more. There are still things to be fleshed out, as you would expect from an early access title, however, they started great and I can't wait to see what's next for this games' development.

On top of this, the game remains true to its source material. It's difficult to honour such a blooming franchise, especially not in a battle-royale game. But the developers try, and do a fine job with collectibles, unlocking lore and info in a separate menu. Allowing some fun for the people interested in the franchise behind it, but not distracting the enjoyers of this game on its own.

I truly hope this game continues to grow and bloom, and I will be able to keep enjoying it for a lot of time to come. Anyway, you don't have to take my opinion for it, just play it for free, and make up your own.
(I bought the Battle Pass already to give some dollar signs in support of the franchise, hoping it receives enough love to have a chance in this market.)

I usually don't post reviews, but I feel like I should make an exception for Sea of Thieves.

Gameplay
The gameplay of Sea of Thieves is great, only a bit repetitive. You have different factions to grind, with each having its own formula of few different kind of missions. (Kill skeletons, gather skulls, repeat) (Solve riddle / find cross on map, dig treasure, repeat) ...
If you're not a big fan of that kind of grind, doing the same thing over and over, this might not be your cup of tea.
To break up this chain of repetition, there is however often a breath of fresh air with random events such as skeleton ships spawning, megalodon chasing you, or some PVP action lurking at the horizon.

These events are often not very beginner friendly, as you can be caught off-guard in a situation where you're already low on supplies, just clinging on to your precious loot.

PVP
The PVP aspect is great fun, and doesn't necessarily require too much skill. However you will often find yourself messed up by the pirate that has gathered this PVP skill before you.
You'll often find somebody running up to you faster than you can say "arrr" and 1 shotting you with a shotgun to the face.

The same goes for the boat combat. Due to the different canon balls, chain shots, mix with physical combat, you'll have that learning curve of being able to have a majority of people, and still being sunk easily by a single pirate.
Again here, you'll be upset when it happens, but after a few times you'll have learned all the ways "pro pirates" attempt to take down your ship. And in no time you'll be taking down ships yourself.

Do however understand that this is a pirate game, and you will lose a lot of the loot you worked for very hard. Usually the pirates that got something to lose themselves, keep to themselves. So don't expect much gain yourself out of battling them. Except for the opportunity to not lose all your stuff.

My issuues with the game
I like the game a lot, but I can not give it a positive review on steam due to the following aspects.

The devs do a fine job of fixing bugs pretty fast (around 4-5 days for a lot of them). And they can be very annoying when they are encountered. Recently there was a game lasting for half a week, that when the game moved you from server, you would keep falling through your ship and rowboat. I've had it happen on multiple occasions with a lot of loot on the ship, all lost cause you were forced to leave the game and restart your ship.
Other bugs which last for way longer periods are for example, enemies spawning inside of rocks where you can't get them. Causing you to have to try many different ways to have them respawn, with varying success.

Since a pirate's life, mobs are pretty busted. With during your quests, seamonsters, ghost pirates, other skellies spawning massively and being a nuisance. When you're used to the game, you deal with it easily, but I can see beginners having a really bad time with dying constantly to them. Also people griefing in the pirate's life tales where they are there too.

My biggest problem with the game however is the moderation. The moderation of this game is a huge problem and is awfully easy to exploit. Read the TOC very carefully, and if you are the type to get upset about people constantly respawning to come mess with you, or when your hard earned loot gets stolen, this game might not be good for you.
The easiest way to give somebody a bad time, is just harassing them, bait them to lash back, make clip of the lash back, report. The game doesn't have a "warning" system, or muting. You can have a 1000 hours and 1000 dollar in the game, you're still at risk of being banned for a week over "normal insults" (Imagine f*ck*r, ...).
Same with streamers, even if you don't know they are streamers, and you return to their ship cause they attacked you, they clip it, claim you're streamsniping, you're banned. And "Customer Support is not able to provide any further details about your suspension." maybe if you're lucky you get a decent customer support engineer, but according to many forums that's not very likely.

I'll continue playing the game regardless of that moderation point, but it will be without mic, and server hopping the moment I get sunk. It's sad that you have to cling to similar methods when you've supported a game since the beginning, and with a lot of financial support.

But that's a pirates life for you.

I'm a founder and I payed money for the game and I still love it.