Recent reviews by gaka

I'm a simple man. I see New Blood Interactive -> I click buy.

This is one of the best movement shooters I've played. For me the best part of the game is how satisfying the movement is and how good all the guns feel. The visual and sound feedback you get when shooting is great. The rougelite element comes second. If you make up your mind about what build you want to play this run you'll usually be able to get the perks and the weapons you want. You have to get really unlucky with the rolls to have to restart. You make your own luck in a sense. Don't expect much from the procedural generation. The levels feel pretty much the same from one run to the next but that's perfectly fine.

Edit: the soundtrack is fire

This game teaches you how to climb a mountain and then gives you a bunch of mountains to climb. Very well designed difficulty. If you feel comfortable, expect to get challenged very soon. Climbing is very fun. You really get to know your ability to act under pressure. Do I keep my rope or do I harness myself for this difficult jump? If I harness myself I usually make the jump first time. If I don't harness I feel stress and very often fail trivial jumps. It's very satisfying to notice that those jumps you used to harness for have now become trivial. Seagulls can go suck my balls.

The game is way too short. The climbing mechanic felt novel in the first 10 minutes but quickly got old. The new concepts that the game introduces thoughout the playthough do not feel much different. "there's a time limit to climbing this section" "you get a jump boost from doing that in this particular spot". Exploration is boring. There's one main path, if you go out of the way of the main path you stumble upon a story piece and then have to find your way back to the main path. This game would be nice to play on the couch on steam deck, but it runs very poorly. Low settings, FSR enabled and i still get very bad frame pacing. The ending just got me mad.
You climb this huge tower and seemingly in the middle of the tower you grab onto this flying creature that yeets you all the way to the top and then dies for some reason. It takes away the achievment of you climbing the huge tower on your own.

Would recommmend only at a heavy discount.

A worthy sequal to a great puzzle game.

I did not expect the game to grab my attention this much. I bought it on a sale because i heard a few good words about it and was gathering dust in my library untill one morning opened it expecting to play an hour but the game had me glued to the chair. It's absolutely worth full price. It's not that long, but it's very dense.

This game is an absolute gem. Every level has a unique theme and a unique mechanical twist. There are enough levels to justify buying at full price. Replayability is also great when you start going for S and P ranks.

This game is pure joy.

This game tries so hard to make me want to hate it.

It wants to be an open world but it's bad at being an open world. I think this would be a better game if it were linear.
No jump button!
Tacked on upgrade system. Seriously if you're going to put an upgrade system for the sake of "progression" please add a button to automatically apply the best available gear.
The traversal in this game is utter garbage. And you do allot of traversal. Climbing is as boring as in any other 3rd person game. You jump only if a button prompt allows you to. You can't fall when traversing. You get the obvious "loading spots" where you have to squeeze through a tight space, slooowly open a door, forcing you to move through it and closing behind you right after, etc. They could have made traveling with the boat at least a little bit interesting or challenging, but no! You hold direction, boat goes there.
Forced boring puzzles.

Sony has been playing too safe. It's been following all the game design trends of that time and have done almost no innovation. It made one of the best games to watch on youtube.

So why the positive review you ask?

This game is a great visual spectacle. When i finished the first boss-battle i had a big stupid grin on my face. All the glory kills are great. The wulver (werewolf) one is my favorite!
This game probably has the best voice acting in the medium. I can't think of another game that even comes close.
The combat is good. If not great! I would say it comes close to the greats in the genre, metal gear rising and devil may cry. It's not quite there, but maybe in the next game they'll make it. The feedback of hitting an enemy with the axe is the best!
The story is great. There is major character progression. Even the side characters are interesting. And the father-son dynamic is handled beautifully. When that little sh-t started saying "whatever" i wanted to whoop his as so much! (you'll know what i mean)
This is one of those games where you don't even think about skipping the cutscenes.
Graphics and performance are great.

I've played games with better graphics, games with better combat and games with better story, but God of War is great in all 3 aspects together! And let me tell you a secret, when you combine great graphics, great combat and a great story, you get a great game.

Relax and build some houses. Memorize all the patterns that emerge with different house combinations. Even If you close your eyes and click randomly you're guaranteed that something beautiful will come up.