Recent reviews by ESD

Gateway to hundreds of boardgames on the Workshop. Sure, nothing beats playing physical, but the chicken in my hands is better than the beef in the freezer.

Besides, there are a bunch of boardgames out there where it's clear what the designers really wanted was a videogame. Seriously, some of these things have so much overhead with stat-tracking, tokens, figures, modules, charts, boards upon boards, panels upon panels, cards everywhere, not to mention the amount of space you'd need to hold it all!

Try Tabletop Sim.

If you want to play something simple and entertaining, you can hardly do worse. HoloCure is based on Vampire Survivor's simple loop, and even if you know nothing about HoloLive, you can still enjoy everything this game offers, especially since it's free.

Seriously, there have been multiple games I've gotten or played for free, and ended up wanting my free back.

The main difference between VS and HoloCure is that each character in this game's massive (unlockable) cast has her own unique weapon as well as a set of unique passives obtainable by leveling. Weapon ascensions have multiple combos too (some of them at least), so there's some discovery in finding what weapons can combo with what, unless you're a guidefaq.
There's also a side mode that lets you farm, fish, and put random stuff inside a house. To what end? Who knows. It does let you gain coins to unlock more stuff with at least.

So of course I recommend. Unlike VS there's no multiplayer, but the developer's currently working on HoloXBreak (another excellent free game, like Streets of Rage or Little Fighter 2), so you might be waiting a while for that.

if the keygens and cracks from the late 90s turned into a cool game instead of opening and closing your cd tray

This game uses GFWL. It's a headache, I know. There are multiple guides to get it to work, but your experience may vary.
This game may also be unable to work with CPUs that run a lot of cores, so be aware of methods to reduce active cores. It seems AMD's latest chips are like this. So if you think your issue has been narrowed down to this possibility, but you're uncomfortable with messing around your BIOS settings, I'm afraid that'll put you in a bind.

Okay. Now, that said.

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This is clearly a game built for four player co-op, and it's one of the best. It's like Monster Hunter with guns, if you will.
It won me over pretty early when I found out I could hitch a ride off the side of my friend's VS (this game's version of mech vehicles). There's a freedom of movement afforded by the grappling hook that's pretty satisfying to utilize as there tends to be a vertical element to each map, and exploration is rewarded with either a deadly angle to fire upon your enemies and/or more weapons and ammo. Which you'll need, because if all you've got to take down that turret emplacement is a machine gun, you're going to be ducking in and out of cover for a while.

Weapons on foot are standard but effective: the versatile machine gun, the long ranged sniper rifle, the VS-busting rocket launcher, etc. Not to mention grenades, which come in several flavors. Want a plasma grenade to stun a wide area? Or throw a discus grenade at long range? Or even that stupid-ass dummy grenade? There's an entire class of VS weapons as well. Generally, these are mounted on the VSes that you can ride, and you can swap them out with other VS weapons lying around if you run out of ammo (you have to power down the VS and get out first, or have a friend swap them while you're powered down).
You can also wield them yourself on foot(!), but at the cost of being unable to switch weapons without dropping it.

There are several types of VSes too! I'm not gonna spoil those, but suffice it to say that it makes playing with three other friends so much more satisfying. Hanging off the side of my friend's VS is only a part of that fun.
Enemy types are somewhat varied. Of course there are human enemies with guns (and rocket launchers, ♥♥♥♥ those guys) of their own, but the Akrid take center stage as the real threat. Differing in size, ability, and behavior, each one demands different tactics to survive, especially the G-class Akrid which are essentially boss monsters.

Scenarios and maps are well-crafted too. Depending on your temperament (and weapon availability) you might find solace in sniping enemies from afar while a friend flanks them with a shotgun up close. Or JUST GET IN THE DAMN ROBOT AND WRECK ♥♥♥♥ UP WITH YOUR MOUNTED PILE BUNKER. ONE MAN SITS IN THE LEFT GUNNER'S SEAT, ONE MAN SITS IN THE RIGHT, AND ONE MAN DRIVES. BECOME UNSTOPPABLE


(Wt ring u got bithc?)
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So what are the issues? Well, as long as we ignore the GFWL business and the too-many-CPU-cores nonsense...

Single-player is garbage. Co-op is what makes this game work, including, and especially because of, certain VSes and without it, you're left with unfeeling bland AI partners. There's one mission in particular that comes to mind, and without three other friends running around yelling over voice chat and getting ♥♥♥♥ done (or not, as the case may be) it's not nearly as engaging.

Controls can be a little hard to grasp. This game supports both KBM and controller. Seeing as it was originally a 360 game it makes sense, but double check your control settings because, much like Monster Hunter, there are several buttons with many uses depending on your current state.

And, as a marginal issue I suppose, your survival is tied to your heat gauge. Generally, you gain heat by killing enemies or contributing to the capture of a data post. You use it to regenerate life, but you also use it for everything you do inside a VS, including repairs. You can also use heat to open up chests for extra weapons, but it's totally random what you get. When you're out of heat, you can't regenerate, and you can't operate a VS.
And when you die, you lose some BP, or battle points, which are shared by the whole team. And running out of BP means you, well, lose the mission. And losing is always a problem, isn't it?

So yes, if you want to play this game properly, you have a pretty high wall to scale.
First, you need to get GFWL working. Then, if you have a CPU with tons of cores, you need to disable most of them to get under the limit that Lost Planet 2 can handle. And THEN, you need three other friends not only willing to play, but willing to put up with the previous two steps just to get the game to run.

You know what I think? I think it's worth it.

But then, I don't have an AMD processor. I understand why people would be upset about that. So by all means, count me in the camp of "This game needs a remaster."

Strange. Contains many interesting ideas concerning everything from inventory to weaponry and abilities, as well as style, goal progression, and storyline. Unfortunately levels are way too large with far too many stretches of nothing. Yeah there are plenty of exciting moments, but some maps are just absurd in the amount of legwork required to get from one point to another.

Ultimately it gets a yes from me because of all the unique implementations of seemingly basic mechanics.
Also, the freedom it allows you in terms of character build is directly proportional to the degree of possible nearly-game-breaking ploys you can make. It even seems like certain sections of the game (probably conditional, since we ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up so much ♥♥♥♥ during missions and the game still let us continue -- WITH ONE OUTSTANDING EXCEPTION which forced us to restart the map once we realized we couldn't move forward from it. not enough of an issue to unrecommend, just know it can happen) expect you to do the unorthodox.
PLAY WITH FRIENDS

Disclosure: I'm Renown level 10 with a character at level 11.
Like I'm prone to say with any game that allows it: play this with friends. The ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ is best witnessed with two buddies by your side.

And I say "♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥", but this game's usage of dicerolls and randomization is less egregious than many other examples I've seen. This, with all the rogue-♥♥♥♥ games out on the market today, ought to be high-♥♥♥♥♥♥♥-praise, honestly.

The tactics involved are organic and the ruleset is entirely reasonable. Block and armor cards (the major sources of RNG pain) have several counters and they're all good.
I don't care about competitive multiplayer and neither do my friends. You really ought not to in this game anyways, since the baseline of competitive play requires max-level characters and equipment.

10/03/2016
I have found out that PVP does not require max level characters. All PVP characters are set to level 18, rather, where characters are given 8 power tokens, four blue and four orange.
The actual maximum level goes far beyond that but has no bearing on PVP.
So to amend: Don't worry about competitive multiplayer until your characters hit 18. You won't have the equipment to compete before then anyway, and the lessons you learn about the game's systems along the way are valuable.

THIS IS HOW YOU DO IT

A cute little action game that feels criminally incomplete. Add more levels, more enemies, more twists on the two-platform system and allow abilities to take effect immediately after you get the CDs for them (the current system is dumb, it forces you to die in order to receive the abilities they grant before actually being able to beat the bosses) and you've got something that could be called an arcade game.

Nowhere near the same level of beauty or challenge found in older shooters.

Decent game for a little while, even if it is lacking cohesion. Pick a map, any map - no matter what, on the last wave the big bad responsible for the whole mess you're in comes to try and kill you. Every single time. How many Patriarchs could there be!?

Perks were fun to mess around with, but I reached a point where the grind became unreal and I started hating everything. I really wish there had been a real campaign to facilitate this process instead the same several maps over and over.

Good, but don't dig too deep. Play with friends.