Recent reviews by Leuie

Games are meant to be played.

In a field of other (not many) arpgs UNDECEMBER stands apart. It bridges the gap between familiar games like diablo/poe and mmos like lost ark. Combat begins easy for novice players as the game teaches you how to play and introduces you to its systems. As you progress through the acts the game starts scaling much harder and becomes visceral. You have to focus and engage. The story is well crafted, voice acted, and has a point that makes the arrival of your character in the world mean something.

On the topic of fun this game, for me, checks the boxes.
In regards to monetisation practices the game is aligned with the new normal.

Free to play model with a cash shop incentivizing purchases that are:

one time
+stash tabs
+currency tabs
+game packs containing fast start resources (can be egregious)

on-going
+pet auto-loot
+dyes

and other purchases that can contain things that do give an advantage. All of those advantages will and can be obtained/negated by gamers willing to 'play the game.'

To conclude, my 50hr review is a positive one. I am enjoying my time in UNDECEMBER and like their additions to the arpg market. When there is good competition in the market forcing companies to attract customers to their games we all win. I look forward to more content, endgame and the future from LINE.

Great game,

The MMO for me.

If you're a fan of MMORPG's and isometric games akin to PoE/Diablo this will be the perfect mash up for you. Lots of content, story and free-99. Can't beat that.

EDIT-July 15, 2022:

After playing another 1700 hours+ my recommendation is the same. I have 10 characters have achieved 1495 with my main and 8/10 characters are 1370 or above.
If you are looking for a game that is grindy and you can feel the weight of the time put in, this is definitely up your alley. Upgrades are felt and the difficulty becomes manageable after you understand mechanics and achieve item levels.
In regards to the monetisation of the game, what you see is what you get. You do NOT have to whale in this game. The developer is generous with daily login rewards, events, and game mechanics such as rested. If you complete your dailies, weeklies and guild missions you should be well positioned to stockpile resources to enhance your account. However if you are a person that likes to compete for world firsts or devotes a bunch of time you may feel dismayed that others can pay to progress at the same rate as you. I caution that this doesn't affect your gameplay and you should not let that hamper your experience.
With a good group of friends and a little luck you will enjoy the time you have.

I reserve the right to return to my review at a later date. As it stands I still give the game 5/5.

This game. Wow. I... no, my brain wasn't ready. Many things I've desired in RPGs encompassed into one game. Round of applause to Larian, keep up the good work.

GOTY.

Now, let me go back and play some more.

Full review incoming.

With a perfect blend of intuition and ingenuity, LYNE is a lovely little logic puzzler that can make you feel stupid and gifted in a single moment. Highly recommend for those relaxing evenings.

I have never been interested in the Survival gaming genre.

Day-Z: SA changed that for me. The first month I lost myself in it's elements. For those 30 or so days whenever I had the chance to game it was with my friends scouring the lands of Chernarus. After awhile my sense of adventure waned and the game lost the attention of my friends and myself. We waited for updates. Waited very patiently. We began to look for something similar. 7 days to Die, Rust, Nether, The Forest... then we chanced upon this little known gem.

Beasts of Prey.

It has a great mix of all of the above yet provides its own flavor and recipe for success.

Multiplayer? Check.
Survival? Check.
Gathering? Check.
Crafting? Check.
PvP/PvE? Check.
Private servers? Check. (Free at that.)

Then there are updates. My goodness this team! I don't know how they pump out these core updates this fast. I swear I have not seen a team throw out community driven (wanted/asked for) updates like this in well... ever. It's a breathe of fresh air. From recipe creation (light towers) to providing player inventory save states to spawn protection and code cleanup. They've got it down and it's a recipe for success.

I paid the original price of $34.99 even though it's early access because I like giving chances and they've made me happy that I've received everything I wanted and more. You want to have the survival/crafting/sandbox experience the others failed to provide? Try this.

You won't be disappointed.

Let me get one thing out of the way here at the start of the review, if you don’t have time to put hours into a game then Civilization V may not be for you. Heck if you enjoy having a life outside of a game then this might not be for you. I say this because once you sink your teeth into Civilization V it’s easy to loose track of time and become completely engrossed in your quest to build your civilization.

So let me first give you my background in playing Civilization games which is a short one I played the last two games (Civ IV and Civ Revolution) and enjoyed both of them quite a bit. When I started looking at some of the early previews of Civilization V I have to admit I wasn’t sure I was ready to put the time and strategy into the world of Civilization. However from the opening load screen and the first few minutes of my first game I was instantly brought back to remembering why this is such an impressive franchise.

For newcomers to Civilization, Civilization V may be one of the best games to get into. The game has an incredible tutorial and also will help you in your first games with helpful hints throughout. Either way if you have not played a Civilization game before this game seems well suited to hold your hand and then let you on your way. One thing that I found especially useful for me was the advisors in the game who basically give you tips on areas you should focus on in your civilization. You don’t have to take their advice but often times they will all agree on one topic and that usually should be a solid indication that you want to address that area.

One barrier of entry that Firaxis broke down in Civilization V was the menus throughout the game. Where in previous games you were often left wondering what to do next, this is by far the user-friendliest experience I have experienced in any Civilization game. Even as some one who has played Civilization games in the past I was very impressed with how approachable things were in this game, everything just felt far more intuitive then in past games.

What stood out to me most about Civilization V was not only how accessible it was but how great of a strategy experience it manages to be. There is no denying that you can spend a whole day on just one game of Civilization. In fact unless you really have the stamina to play all day most games will span over the course of a couple of 5+ hour sittings. Civilization V (like Civ games before it) has this way of engrossing you into the story even if there isn’t an already established plot. You create your own plot, your own direction, and your own goals. Sure the game does give you hints on how to get the desired outcome but the strategy is so dead on that you have the ability to go your own way to your desired outcome.

A lot of the talk around Civilization V before the games release was on the new hexagon setup which to be honest is a change for the game but nothing that really changes the way you play the game. This is a turn based strategy game through and through and to be honest it is one of the best strategy games I personally have ever played.

Graphics

Without a doubt Civilization V has a much stronger visual presence then what we had in past Civilization games. The graphics have never been a big part of the Civilization experience however that all changed in this game. Visually this is a stunning game, it has a great mechanic to switch from strategy views to just a global view. If you prefer to look at the game as more of a grid you can do that, if you want to look at the game as a living world you can do that as well. This is by far the best looking Civilization game out there and it once again lessens the blow of how expansive of a strategy game it really is.

Fun Factor

For newcomers to the series there is of course going to be a learning curve no matter how good the tutorial is. However for seasoned veterans to the series you will be able to jump right in and take advantage of one of the most enjoyable games of strategy I have ever played. What is even more exciting about Civilization V is that you not only can play offline but can play online with friends. There is also going to be an ever-growing population of mods to the game that will continue to increase replay-ability. Let’s face it though I have not played two games of Civilization that ever felt even remotely similar each game feels like a brand new experience.

Overall

Civilization V is one of the best strategy games I have ever played. There are some issues but those are so minor in comparison to all the great things Firaxis has done to not only make this accessible to new players but even returning players as well. I can say with great confidence that you will not get a better game of strategy right now then what Civilization V has to offer, it is just that good.

Dallas, Chains, Hoxton, and Wolf are reunited for a second string of amoral moneymaking, propelled by a variety of missions involving breaking and entering, classic bank robbery, and even simple property damage across a range of maps that, while often recycled, feature randomized elements to keep things interesting. Yet again, success hinges on teamwork as four players strategize, watch backs, and hold off waves of progressively deadly police forces.

This time around, missions are picked up by accessing Crime.net, a virtual map that locates and displays all active online missions. There is an offline mode too, but the allied A.I. is so utterly useless as to render it an endeavor without meaning. Suffice it to say, you're going to need to go online if you've any hope of making out like a bandit.

Missions appear and disappear in real-time as they become available, and range from simple one-stage jobs to longer, story-based crimes that take place over several days and are broken up into anywhere from two to seven stages. Missions are also graded by difficulty, allowing you to hop right into an easy job or ramp things up by tackling an Overkill mission. The harder the difficulty, the greater the enemy resistance, and the more likely an appearance of vicious special enemies, such as the annoying Shield or terrifying Heavy.

Each mission is impressively paced, and far more varied than last time. In one stage, you'll be tasked with entering a mall and doing $50,000 worth of damage for a protection racketeer. Another involves robbing three stores at once and making out with the goods. One multipart stage involves robbing an art gallery, holding a position from cops after the escape van crashes, and finally executing a shady trade of goods before the police invariably show up. Oh, and yes, there is a mission where you have to break bad and cook up some meth.

A good number of missions can be played either stealthily or noisily. If you go in, all guns blazing, take hostages and decide to smash-and-grab, you'll end up defending your location against timed police assaults before fighting your way out with your earnings. A quiet approach involves sneaking past cameras, knocking out opponents, pretending to be guards over a pager system (which is always amusing), and hoping to Hermes you don't get anybody too suspicious. It's more difficult to pull off a stealth win, requiring both practice and a mastery of special skills, but it's possible. I've not seen it done personally, but it's possible!

Players level up and earn spending money after each successful job, which can in turn be used to gain new skills, unlock guns, and customize masks. There are four skill trees to choose from -- Mastermind, which involves dominating enemies while supporting allies; Engineer, which uses vault drills more efficiently and can use mines or turrets; Enforcer, which is all about combat and shotgun efficiency; and Ghost, the handy stealth class that can sneak in and evade detection.

Guns are all of the standard variety -- pistols, assault rifles, shotguns, etc. -- but there's a heck of a lot of them, and all can be customized with parts randomly won at the end of a job. Masks are also a big deal this time around, the usual clown varieties added to with mummies, demons, and other ghoulish fun. Masks are also acquired as random "drops" and can be further customized with material skins, logos, and colors. With the skills, weapons, and masks combined, there's plenty of scope to create your perfect master criminal, and the encouragement to progress is there in spades.

Everything costs money, though, and while you'll be earning buckets of cash at the end of each stage, it can disappear quickly. Unlocking skills takes both unlockable skill points and an injection of hot cash, with the dollar toll rising to hundreds of thousands in no time. This isn't usually a problem, but if you tend to respec a lot, as I did in the early goings and even now, you'll find yourself playing catch-up as you don't get all your money back.

Each heist is nicely designed, with a terrific sense of escalation, especially when the plan gets chaotic and things start to go wrong. The idea of risk and reward adds an extra level of dynamics to each job, as you have to weigh going back for extra valuables against the army of SWAT specialists now standing between your escape van and goods you've left behind. You can also unlock assets that add extra benefits during the game, such as a hidden ammo cache or an inside man.

PAYDAY 2 is just as fun, and measurably more involving, than the first game, but some issues get in the way of the amusement. Matchmaking could stand to be more efficient, as joining an existing game holds the match up for everybody, while the lack of any sort of host migration -- which shouldn't even be a consideration these days -- is a real pain in the ass. There are also a number of glitches and bugs that can occur, and the way stages simply end -- as well as a number of missing features such as safehouse customization -- lead to a title that feels somewhat unfinished.

Despite some of these flaws being quite egregious, Overkill has still provided a massive laugh of a game, and it says a lot about the quality of what's there that potentially dealbreaking issues don't really manage to kill the overwhelming enjoyment I've been having with the thing. Matches are tense and the fantastic music keeps the blood pumping, while finally getting to within hopping distance of the escape van provides a sense of exhilaration rarely found in similar shooters these days.

That said the thrill of robbing banks, smashing jewel cases, and cooking meth is too great for the asking price not be returned to the player in spades. If you're willing to work with a team and get involved in some delightfully chaotic situations, the world of poorly made drills and unnecessary amounts of violence is one well worth investing in.

I give this 4 thumbs up out of 5. Recommended.