Resident Evil: Requiem

General impressions

        As a standalone Resident Evil game, it’s alright. Without Leon’s inclusion, I would consider it a subpar, mediocre title full of plot holes and nostalgia bait. With Leon, it becomes a slightly above‑average, memberberries‑heavy experience. There are only two areas where you can actually explore and enjoy the classic survival‑horror elements you’d expect from Resident Evil. The rest is dominated by forced walking sections, narrow hallway exploration, and an oversaturation of scripted animations. By my third playthrough, I was groaning.

        That said, I did enjoy many of the references that weren’t tied to previous RE games—similarities to recent movies like The Gorge or Barbarian, and even The Walking Dead comics (Leon’s hatchet use is almost identical to Rick’s zombie‑dispatching panels). These nods were fun.

Story and characters

        This is the weakest part of the game. Grace as a protagonist simply doesn’t make sense. Leon is fine, but just like in the RE4 remake, he’s written far too seriously. His one‑liners rarely land, and there are very few of them anyway. After Death Island, which was silly but at least fun, I thought we were getting Leon back on track.

        The story and characters feel directionless. Or rather—they clearly want to be serious and dramatic, but Leon’s quips are inserted almost as an obligation. Returning franchise characters are extremely underutilized; they might as well not be there. The ending teases more returning characters for no real narrative reason, clearly to sell DLC.

        The amount of nostalgia bait is overwhelming: bosses, lines, locations—almost half the game is recycled from older titles. There’s very little originality. The retcons are plentiful too, which I’ve sadly learned to accept in modern media that relies heavily on what we loved 20–30 years ago, while simultaneously rewriting it to fit a new narrative.

Gameplay

        As mentioned, when the game gives you a classic open map with puzzles and enemies, it shines. Unfortunately, there are only two such areas. The rest is essentially a hallway simulator à la FFXIII, with forced dialogue and slow, scripted animations.

        Grace is supposed to represent survival horror, and Leon is supposed to represent action. But if you have half a brain, you quickly figure out how to kill or avoid enemies as Grace, and the horror evaporates. With Leon, it’s just more enemies, more ammo, more shooting. He can upgrade weapons with attachments, but they barely make a difference—nothing like the upgrade systems in OG RE4 or the remake.

        Grace’s “blood crafting” feels weak and unnecessary. I used it in my first playthrough, again for the achievement, and then ignored it entirely.

        The game is also very short. My first playthrough took seven and a half hours, fully exploring everything and reading all notes. After three playthroughs, I had every achievement. Meanwhile, I have over 100 hours in RE4 Remake and still haven’t completed all achievements.

Overall

        It’s a very mixed experience. I enjoyed the true Resident Evil‑style maps and the references to media outside the franchise. But the game is too short, too easy, offers little payoff for its buildup, and leans far too heavily on nostalgia.

        If you’re a casual fan or someone who has only played the remakes, this game might work for you. But for me, the biggest sign of how weak the storytelling and characters were is that, after finishing it, the main question I had was not Where is the story going next, but: Who is Leon married to?

        6/10. Slightly above average.

Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017)

 

        Yakuza Kiwami 2 runs in a new Dragon Engine, which is very fresh, fluid and has somewhat silly ragdoll physics, which reminded me of good old Bethesda games. However, apart from those, there are no similarities here. While it was not as good as Yakuza 0, it is still a fantastic game that I thouroughly enjoyed. Once again, I will not be spoiling the major story beats in this post, even though I will be describing some of the new characters and some of the situations they find themselves in. 

        Right off the bat I was happily surprised by the new UI, the gameplay, the movement fluidity as well as the beautiful graphics of this game. I do not really care about graphics, however I feel like it is worthwhile to mention when they are outstanding in a series. Some people have expressed the opinions that Zero and Kiwami 1 did not look good, I would disagree. I am used to playing vanilla Morrowind, so my bar for graphics is not that high. In any case, the fresh new design is not where the new stuff ends, however. The game also has a revamped leveling system, which I also really like. While I enjoyed the new leveling system in Kiwami 1, it felt very similar to Final Fantasy X, which while maintaining a wide grid of skills and abilities, it really just presented an illusion of choice, because you could not really pick what you wanted (kind of like the sphere grid in FFX). Here, in Kiwami 2 that is not the case. The levelling system is very robust and full of choices. You can level up base attributes as well as focus on specific moves and proficiencies. There are also "overworld" upgrades which help you sprint for longer, gain more XP, eat more food before you become full, etc. Kiwami 2 truly is the most RPG of the three Yakuza games that I played (being Zero and Kiwami 1). From what I gathered online this is very similar to what those are in Yakuza 6. 

        As far as some of the other content is concerned, I have to say that unlike the first Kiwami, the substories in this one do not suck. The first Kiwami had very boring and same-y substories where everyone was trying to scam Kiryu and these got old very fast. Also, the cabaret management mini game comes back, even though you are playing as Kiryu in this game, it is still fantastic and the story has a very nice twist near the end. 

Ever since Yakuza 0, I always felt like Butters from
that one episode of SP during cabaret management.

        Alright, so without spoiling too much about the story of the game, I would love to at least try and describe the characters in this game. My experience with the Yakuza series so far has been that it is very story and character driven, while the gameplay itself (while good) is secondary. And oh boy, the characters in this game are amazing. 

        I am (finally) starting to really like Kiryu and I get now why do people love this dude so much (Majima is still my favorite character). Kiryu is even more mature, more responsible, he really is the stoic chad by now. No longer relying on the Tojo clan or Shintaro Kazama (his father figure), Kiryu is finally his own man in this game. As far as original characters go in media go, he really is very the stereotypical good guy. He always tries to do the right thing, he is not afraid to beat someone up in order to help people. He is also not afraid to do some really weird shit for strangers - I mean whatever you get down to during substories really is super weird (and I am all here for it). Kiryu's reactions to adult men in diapers being fed milk is priceless (ok, this substory does kind of suck, but in a good way). 

Substory: Be My Baby

        Sayama is another new character who really hits all the tropes of a japanese female character, but it never gets to the levels of Garnet from FFIX and she actually becomes pretty interesting. What I found out throughout my years of playing video games is that rarely do female characters from Japanese media become something else other than eye-candy or plot devices. It is very rare for a female character to truly be interesting (in Japanese media). See Agrias from FFT, if you want an example of a badass lady. So, Sayama was really surprising. Even though when she entered the story, I really rolled my eyes and could not get into it. She starts as a badass strong independent lady cop, who becomes extremely vulnerable and feminine the second the meets Kiryu. Cue the eyeroll. In any case, once the game's story developed, I really liked her relationship with Kiryu and the Yakuza. And that is pretty much it without spoiling it. I liked how she overcame some of the stereotypes and despite never beating others, her story still tucked on my heartstrings. 

        I must also mention Ryuji Goda, the main antagonist of this game. I think I love him even more than Kuze from 0. He is setup as a foil to Kiryu - both have the Dragon moniker in the yakuza world and while Kiryu mostly wants to be left alone, Ryuji wants to rise to the top just like Kiryu did in the previous game. Unlike most of his compatriots in the Omi Alliance (a rival yakuza to the Tojo Clan), Ryuji is an honorable dude who wants to win, but in the fairest (and most direct) possible way. There are some other minor antagonists in the game who kidnap Haruka, an orphaned child that Kiryu is taking care of in order to curry favor with Ryuji and the way Ryuji reacts is priceless. It also cements him as the main antagonist who is above petty tricks and underhanded tactics. I love this guy. 

        There is also a lot of returning characters. It seems I am forever cursed with the presence of Yakuza Columbo Date. For many scenes whenever he appears I keep asking the question, why is he still here? I understand that he forms a bond of friendship with Kiryu in later games (and eventually, while playing Yakuza 8 I did finally warm up to him), but his inclusion in most of the main story makes little sense to me. I have to mention that I did love the relationship between Kiryu and Daigo, who has also become one of my favorite characters in the franchise. 

        All in all, I really loved Yakuza Kiwami 2. The Majima saga was terrific, even though short, Ryuji is my favorite other character (with Kashiwagi), the relationship between Kiryu and Sayama was fantastic and I loved that we actually got to see it happen and develop, unlike the one with Yumi, who barely has any screen time in the first game. I was not bothered at all by the new Dragon Engine, unlike most players when I was looking up the reception online. I liked this game very much! For me, this was a very solid 8/10. 

Yakuza Kiwami (2016) - The (Pre)Sequel Original Remake

        Immediately after finishing my Yakuza 0 spree (and becoming a cabaret club mogul), I jumped into Yakuza Kiwami, which is a game that came out one year after Zero. Essentially a remake of the original game from 2005 with some added and changed story elements to better serve as a sequel to Zero. It continues Kazuma Kiryu's storyline and the evolving drama around the Tokyo's Tojo Clan. Once again, I will be keeping this entry short-er. First I wish to describe some of the smaller changes to gameplay and systems, touch a little bit about the storyline (without spoiling major story beats) and then give my overall impressions. 

        Since this is built upon the same engine as Zero (and Yakuza 6), the first feeling of this game is extremely familiar. The UI is pretty much the same, Kiryu's styles are the same (even though they are once again starting from scratch), the movement both during and outside combat feels a bit better and more responsive than Zero. The biggest change to combat progression is via the newly introduced Majima Everywhere - this is how Kiryu now levels up his Dragon of Dojima fighting style. Fresh after starting the game, Kiryu meets Majima (my darling from Zero) who wishes to train him back to what he was like before Kiwami by constantly ambushing him during substories, various side activities, when roaming the overworld map or during random encounters. This is also amped up for comedic effect, but more on that later. As Kiryu, you will be doing whatever it is there to do when suddenly you will have Majima attacking you as if you are Peter Sellers opening a fridge in Pink Panther. 

        I somewhat enjoyed this mechanic, at first. It was fun encountering Majima, but pretty soon I ran out of the "regular encounters" and it turned into puzzles. I was supposed to find him based on descriptions, poems, etc. It was here where I stopped engaging with this system. This is all subjective of course, but the comedy was a hit and miss. 

        There were also many alter egos of Majima, such as Officer Majima, Bartender Majima, Zombie Majima and others. 

     

        Anyway, let's switch straight into characters and story. So, I did not like this version of Majima at all. He was nothing like the Majima from Zero, who was a tragic hero trying hard to be as stoic as possible. I also feel like there was zero (haha) transition from the stoic reserved Majima of the previous game to this one. In Yakuza 0, he changes his hair and clothes, and that is it. Suddenly, he is the Mad Dog of Shimano. There was also no explanation as to why he was so obsessed with Kiryu, as in Zero they have barely met. I have been told that what Majima was in Zero was really an exception, as he always was and is a Joker type character who adores violence, Kiryu and being absurd. I don't know. Not a fan. I also found out that in Kiwami 2 there is more of the Zero Majima, so I am hopeful. 

        A big plot point in the story of Kiwami is the continuation of the relationship between Kiryu and his best friend, Nishiki, whom I never really liked in Zero. Here, Nishiki (sort of) takes center stage and once again, I was not a fan. Dare I say that in the first game there were two moments I liked, but in Kiwami I groaned whenever Nishiki was on screen. Supposedly, most of the added story elements that were absent in the original concern him. I just have to shrug in disappointment. 

         Whenever the politics of the Tojo Clan, including the bosses of Dojima, Kazama and Shimano are on screen (especially at the beginning), I was glued to the screen and loving it. When the story switched to a more personal focus, I had to force myself to continue. 

          One of the new characters in this game was the Tokyo police detective Makoto Date, who had an amazing first scene and my impression has been that of a very cool side character that appears briefly. Suddenly, Date-san was present for 90% of the story and was more involved than Kiryu and I was kept wondering why the hell was this Columbo looking mf still here. 

        Even though I struggled in the middle, I really enjoyed the ending, which tied both Kiryu's personal story as well as the overarching story of the Tojo Clan. I am sort of glad that all the personal ties that were carried over from Zero to Kiwami in regards to Kiryu are done. I liked what they did with some of the new characters and I especially liked Kiryu himself much more than in Zero. Here he seems much more mature. However, I did not care much for this game's characterization of Majima and I did not enjoy the bulk of the main story. The ending had left me satisfied and happy, however. I am looking forward to Kiwami 2. I would rate Kiwami 1 an above average 6/10.

Yakuza 0 (2015) - Slightly insane masterpiece

 

       

        I have never played any Yakuza game before and on a spur of the moment, I just sort of decided to give Yakuza Zero a try. From what I read up on it online, it is a perfect starting point for a newcomer, since it serves as a prequel to the original saga. I was led to believe that this would be a serious mob story, something similar more to Puzzo's Godfather and maybe less of a Scarface. Oh boy, were both accounts so wrong... A disclaimer, before I start: I will not be recapping the main story (because honestly, that would be a novella on its own), although I will be spoiling some of the story elements. Sometimes, I do not want to describe the main story in its entirety, because it was not gripping enough and I do not want to go through with it. Other times, my descriptive paragraphs would not do the story justice. This is the latter. I want to divide this post into several parts - gameplay, characters/story and other elements such as music and visuals. 

        Yakuza 0 is a prequel to a game series by the same name that has started in 2005 and is carrying on until today with sequels, spin offs and a prequel that is this game. It is absolutely massive and until 2015, it had a bigger barrier of entry than the Resident Evil franchise. Despite that fact (and mostly because I was so disappointed with KCD2), I decided to jump onto this train with Zero. Well, it can be technically described as a "Japanese GTA", but that would be a disservice to Yakuza 0. There is a free roam in this game, even though during the story you are mostly guided down a certain path. There are side missions, called substories, which you can access as soon as Chapter 2 starts. There are total 17 chapters in this game. All in all it took me 32 hours to finish it, with some sub stories too. You cannot drive a car in Yakuza, nor cause mayhem on civilians like you can in GTA. So why the comparison? Well, essentially it is a story about the Japanese mob, its criminal activities. From a distance, it looks like a Rockstar game, right? Well, once you get closer, the similarities evaporate. There is a very deep dive into many characters in this game - their motivations, traumatized past, their hopes for the future and eventually their acceptance of all their failures in a very theatrical fashion. There are a ton of side activities too, such as karaoke (my favorite!), fishing, fight club/arena, there is baseball, mahjong, blackjack and disco-dancing, and many others! Each characters also has their own business management mini-game, which honestly, one is much better than the other, but both are alright. 

        The voice performances are so dramatic, so emotional and so very well done, that most of the game I just watched in silence and gasped whenever anything happened. No single performance felt flat, boring or phoned in. Every single person you talk to in the game is fantastic. There are no dips in quality. There never was an abundance of exclamations, sighing or any of that, which is typical to a Japanese game.

        And you will be talking to a lot of NPCs. There is a varied cast of characters - yakuza bosses of several hierarchies, their underlings... you have the chairman, who rules the yakuza supreme, his various clans, their heads, their lieutenants and so on. You have your friends that you meet during the main story and those that you make while free roaming. There are hostesses, police officers, masseurs, there is a dominatrix friend for Kiryu and many others. No single character is simple either, from the two main protagonists that you switch between (every two chapters) to everyone else. Nobody is defined by their profession, but rather each and every person is different and you can get to know them. 

           How best to describe the protagonists? 

        Well there is Kazuma Kiryu, whose story best fits into the mob genre to a T. He is a rookie, who gets caught up in a multi layered pool of politics of the various Japanese yakuza clans, that are vying for power and control of a fictionalized nightlife center of Tokyo. 

        

        Kiryu himself keeps saying how he is a rookie and does not know what it means to be able to take care of himself, let alone others. Which in itself is a rather mature view on life, I must say. He constantly repeats how inexperienced his... and yet at every opportunity, he wipes the floor with everyone. Soon enough, the Dojima family that he is a part of, comes to hunt him as a result of the politics he gets swept up in and there is one particular yakuza boss that Kiryu has to beat several times during the game. Every time he appeared, I was in disbelief. He truly became the "how many times do I have to teach you the same lesson, old man?" The answer is five. Five times, I had to teach him the same lesson. That was one crazy old man. Even though, he became annoying at the end (from a gameplay perspective, his boss mechanics were just... ugh), I enjoyed his insane appearances. For his second boss fight, he charged Kiryu on a motorcycle, bare chested with a steel pipe roaring as if he were possessed!

        

        The spectacle was so great, that at times I felt like I was watching a Japanese underground TV-Show directed by David Lynch, with Tommy Wisseau producing. Even though, it had many over the top situations and moments, the gravitas of the story never dropped and it never became too much. I am loathe to talk about it more, because you need to witness this sheer brilliance and insanity. Kiryu's story has its twists, turns and is somewhat gripping. Even though, I would describe it as very... cliché. Which does not necessarily mean bad, I really enjoyed Kiryu's story, even though it has been mostly to the characters that I have come to like.

    

        

        The other protagonist that you get to know is Goro Majima... And let me just show you what his introduction looks like:

    

        You get a nightclub with band, lights and a huge stage.

    

        Majima is this one eyed suave, gangster looking type, who gets shit done. I was not really sold on Yakuza as a series until the game introduced him. Majima is extremely polite, sometimes flamboyant but that really is something he puts up as a cover; since when the game starts he lives as a prisoner of the clan he once served. For one reason or another, he is forced to oversee a famous nightclub called the Grand that is flourishing under his management, even though the only thing he really wants to do is go back to being a yakuza. As such, he is forced to smile, bow and sometimes take out the occasional (human) trash. What follows is a story that is impossible to describe. Where I found Kiryu to be somewhat cliché and not really that interesting, Majima was like an onion, constantly peeling and shedding layers where each one was so different from the other, that I was glued onto the screen. Despite the fact that Majima really just wanted to get back to being a yakuza asap, his feelings for what is right and wrong never waivered and soon he found himself going against all the rules, because when push came to shove, he just could not do wrong. Majima really is the hero of the story, who goes out of his way to help everyone he can, even if he plays it like that was not his intention. At the same time, Majima is an absolute badass. He might be the eye-patch wearing gentleman, but he is not afraid to show his other side too. 

        Of course, no good deed ever goes unpunished and this is doubly so for Majima. He suffers for everything, which ultimately breaks down all his layers of being a suave gentleman. This progressive transformation has reminded me of one of my favorite movies, Falling Down and how D-Fense abandons all reason by the end.

        

        Majima does not have such a tragic end like Michael Douglas has, but Majima's story has certainly pulled on my heartstrings a lot. There are moments that are extremely sad and at this point, I fully empathize with everyone. I love these characters and I want to see them happy, I want them to succeed. But that is the drama. Make you care about the characters and then see them suffer. Ultimately, Majima has to decide between being a proper yakuza or love and friendship. It sounds corny as hell, but it is so amazingly done, I was heartbroken by the end. 

        

        It is just so rare these days for me to experience this in a video game. Which is to say, this is a 10 year old game. Have the times changed this much?

        What surprised me, in regards to the story was how fantastically developed every character was. Even the obvious villains, who I hated throughout the story had a great arc and it has changed how I felt about them by the end. I was dumbstruck, how phenomenal the writing is here. I cannot stress this enough. If you play videogames for the story, play this! It does not matter whether you are interested in the Japanese mafia, culture or a neo-noir story. I firmly believe that anyone could find great enjoyment here. 

      

        Alright, I mentioned at the beginning that the game switches between characters. I did not mention, that you yourself cannot do the switch manually until the very end, once you have finished the story. That kind of blows, even though once the individual stories meet up near the end, the pacing is excellent. I have to say that every time I finished a Kiryu chapter and I saw that I was playing as Majima, I was very excited. 

        The opposite is also true. Whenever, I got back to Kiryu I was sort of let down, because I did not want to get away from Majima - I wanted to see more of him. 

        The only negative thing I would have to say about Yakuza 0 would be that it suffers from a trend that I have seen mostly in older videogames - there is this thing where the closer you are to the end of a game, the progressively more difficult it gets. This makes sense if you are fighting new enemies, new monster, etc. However, in this one, I was fighting the same guys in suits the whole game, but at the finale, for whatever reason, they would shoot me with guns for a 1/3 of my HP. They would also have insanely high health pools, making them essentially punching sponges. It got a little bit ridiculous at the very end. 

        

        Despite that little annoyance, I loved every moment of Yakuza 0 and I am going back to finish all the substories and finally get filthy rich at the all the property and cabaret management. I also want the S ranking at every karaoke song there is. I need to become a king of the arena, too. Holy shit, Yakuza 0 is a legendary 10/10 game. I cannot recommend it enough. If you have never played it, what are you doing with your life? Do it now! Also there are Shiba Inu doggos everywhere.

        

2024 Rys Retrospective – Part 1 (Games, Movies and TV Shows)

I figured it would be fun to write a blog entry regarding what this year has been like for me in terms of the things that interest me the most – what games have I played, which movies have I seen, what TV shows have I watched. This is what Part 1 will be about. As always, please bear in mind that these are my opinions, that are subjective.

I also do some cosplaying in my spare time and decided to include these interests and highlight this too in the form of the cons I have been to and what props and costumes I crafted. I want to focus on these in Part 2.

 

Rapid Recollections - Videogames

First, I want to take a look at the games – I will be covering those that came out this year as well as ranking them. At the same time, I want to make some remarks of the games that did not come out this year but I have played, for the first time. And there will be some honorable mentions as well. I will try to apply this format to movies and TV shows too.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

First up we have the second game in the FFVII remake trilogy. What can I say about Final Fantasy VII except that I love it to death? This entry not so much, though. Sometimes I love it. Other times I hate it. On one hand, it was really great seeing everyone back together again. They all look so amazing and are so amazingly voice acted. The script however was not so good. On another, the ending to this entry was terrible, because they did not do anything with any of the newly introduced plot elements such as alternate realities. Every aspect of “changing fate” from the first entry was entirely wasted. I am not salty because Aerith died again, but honestly with all the reality shifts and dimension travels they ruined what is a touching scene in the original. The gameplay was amazing, though! I am currently enjoying a hard mode playthrough and it’s the closest I will ever get to Dark Souls Final Fantasy (shoo, Stranger of Paradise, nobody wants you here). For me, this is a 6/10 – slightly above average. I would never recommend this to anyone other than super fans, however.

Alan Wake 2 DLC 1 – Night Springs

Oh man, what a ride. I was absolutely smitten by the base Alan Wake 2 and its only thanks to it, that I have taken up writing other things than reports or academic journaling. So, when I heard that the first DLC was released, I raced to my PS5 and played through it in one sitting – which was not very difficult, since it was rather short. Just like the base game it was great. It followed the format of the fake in-universe TV Show of Night Springs in the Alan Wake world that mirrors the real-life Twilight Zone. Which were my favorite little videos in the first Alan Wake. Here, they made 3 episodes in total that you can play through as part of your adventure in Bright Falls or you can directly load them up from the main menu, which is super convenient for me. Each episode had a different tone, different gameplay and each one helped connect the various games of Remedy entertainment together. There was even another Max Payne reference! 8/10 – very good! I can recommend this to every fan of the base game.

Elden Ring – Shadow of the Erdtree DLC

I do not want to take up too much space with this one, so I will try to be brief. It was very mediocre and after how thoroughly I enjoyed the base game, I was disappointed. The DLC was very big, perhaps four times the size of Ashes of Ariandel and the Ringed City combined and yet, despite that, there was only one area and one boss I actually enjoyed. Quantity does not equal quality. In a similar fashion, none of the new weapons or spells interested me and I played the whole DLC with my old STR/FTH build. They advertised new transformative spells (wings and such) and ashes, but they barely did anything – they were cool the first time, but I found them to be too situational. The final boss was an extreme letdown for me. The mechanics of the DLC when it came to power scaling where you have to collect all the items on the map to have your HP and attack not be divided by a percentage were really annoying. At first, I did not mind it, but after ten hours of running around and looking for shiny balls, I resented it. When it came to new NPCs and their questlines, I enjoyed one of them – Sir Ansbach and that was it. The twist of the story in this DLC was incest and I am so tired of the GRRM writing, please no more. Shadow of the Erdtree is a 5/10 for me. This DLC exists and that is ok, but when I will be replaying Elden Ring in the future, I will be skipping it altogether. I never skip the Dark Souls 3 DLC, though and I do not consider my playthrough of DS3 complete unless I beat Gael, the true final boss.

FFXIV: Dawntrail

Sigh, here we go. Dawntrail is the latest expansion to the critically acclaimed MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV, which I love with every cell in my body. I breathe and live FFXIV. It is the best Final Fantasy game that ever existed (apart from Tactics, which is the best FF game of all time, as we all know). And yet… I hated Dawntrail. It has horrible writing, a boring story, one dimensional characters and it has more filler than an old Honda Civic that your uncle refuses to scrap in the junkyard. What happened to FFXIV? Where are the people that made Shadowbringers? I regret the time and money I poured into this, which was easily more than fifty hours. I hope they can recover from this, but unless they change the core writers it is not happening. From what I have read online, the original writing and localization team has left, so… I hope that is not true. Even if it is, though, we still have Heavensward, Shadowbringers and Endwalker which are all fantastic. Dawntrail is a 2/10 – terrible, please stop this, Yoshida-san.

World of Warcraft: War Within

Another MMORPG expansion hit us later this summer and considering the past three expansions for WoW have been abysmal, I was dreading the War Within. There were good signs. The main architect of the blatant teasing that was Battle for Azeroth, the absolutely disastrous Shadowlands and the mediocre Dragonflight, Steve Danuser has left Blizzard and Metzen was back. How much control he had over the creative direction of War Within remains unknown, but I had hope. And War Within was… alright? It was fine. I enjoyed the questing, the new zones as well as some of the balancing. I enjoyed the story bits with Anduin and Alleria, it was great seeing Khadgar back. I am still enjoying it to this day, I love my Blood DK as well as Ret Paladin. We are getting a goblin patch next and that is a theme I am not hot about, but we shall see. I would give War Within 6/10. Above average and enjoyable. Which is better than I expected from WoW at this point.

Space Marine 2

Before we played SM2, I had my wife play through the original game so she would have some context for the sequel. She knows her way around WHFB, but not about 40k very much. But we both loved Space Marine 2! It was really good. The story was fine, it was typical Warhammer. The gameplay was really good as well – the Tyrannids felt like a proper swarm, an alien hunger that wants to devour the galaxy and fighting them felt titanic in the heavy suits of the Ultramarines. SM2 was also the first WH40k videogame where I felt they nailed the feeling of the grim dark universe. The first game had a somewhat Disney/Avengers feeling to it, where the marines themselves felt larger than life and always saved the day (which is true, but for me there was not enough dark). The demons were also fantastic! The mythos, the lore and the universe of WH40k really came alive in this one. I also had a very brief interaction with the operations PVE multiplayer part of the game, and absolutely loved it! Space Marine 2 is a 9/10 easily. One of the best games of this year for me.

Alan Wake 2 DLC 2 – The Lake House

There was another Alan Wake 2 DLC planned for this year and that came out around spooky season. It is called the Lake House and directly develops the connection between Alan Wake and Control – the other Remedy game set in the same universe. And while I really liked the first DLC, this one felt forced and tacked on. There were really no new revelations, it tackled some themes of an AI creating art - imitating artists, which is a topic I feel strongly about. However, there was very little of interest to me in this DLC apart from some very unique looking monsters. There was a painter who was forced to experiment with the dark energies in Cauldron Lake that react to artists – this is the plot of the first game - Alan travels to Bright Falls, to Cauldron Lake and is swept up in a Twin Peaks mystery where his writing comes alive, but its all dark and twisted. Here, the colors from the paintings dripped from their canvases and formed monsters that chased you around as you explored, but apart from that I felt this was very redundant and did not enhance the experience in any way. 5/10, it exists and I do not mind, but one playthrough was enough for me. I will be skipping this DLC in the future.

Silent Hill 2 Remake

Silent Hill 2 Remake was another great game I played this year. While I still feel that this remake was not necessary, because Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition exists, I still completed this game four times in a row now. The performances were great, the visual style was fantastic, the storytelling was on point. It did not change anything fundamentally from the original game and improved where it could. I have my own reservations about this remake, that I outlined in its separate blog entry, however, I wholly recommend this, even if you never played the original – which is somewhat unusual even for me, as I am mostly against the idea of remakes. In my review I gave it 8/10 and I stand by that. Come on, Bloober Team, give us the original score and Born from a Wish as DLC, I will pay for it right now. Take my money!

I have also played Terminator: Resistance and its DLC, the Annihilation Line. I really liked it; it was very reminiscent of the good non-Bethesda Fallouts (of which I am a great fan). I liked how it tried to tie everything into the first Terminator movies, because let us be honest, those are the only two that exist. There are no other, right? My wife played the Mass Effect trilogy for the first time and I have been watching her play, which has reminded me of my own journey with the series that I deeply love and enjoy. Being a fan of classic RPGs and DnD, I played Owlcat’s Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, which was a fine game at first, however too soon I became to dislike the writing and felt the game was too long. Just now I am finishing a fresh a playthrough of Pillars of Eternity 2, a nice classic RPG by Obsidian and the writing in comparison is miles better.

 

Rapid Recollections – Movies

There have been some movies that we have seen in theatres this year too. Here are my impressions (hopefully) in order.

Dune Part II

            Oh man, I did not enjoy the second Dune as much as I loved the first one. I am a huge fan of Lynch’s original Dune, as well as the book. I read it many times as a kid and have been trying to get through the rest of Herbert’s books as well. I had such high hopes for the sequel after watching the first one and I did not even mind the changes they made to the story and characters. However, the second Dune movie just left me bored and looking at the time. I am also not fan of Zendaya, I am sorry, but her pouting is just not doing it for me. I do not see Chani, I do not see MJ, I just see Zendaya and I cannot disconnect her from the characters, she is always the same. Kind of like the Rock, Jack Black or Kevin Hart. Except, those can be fun, sometimes. I was also disappointed they sacrificed Alia for more Chani and we had no gom-jabar baron assassination. The first hour just felt incredibly long and was not going anywhere in my opinion, while they really rushed the second hour to fit all the story from the book into the movie. By the time Christopher Walken appeared on Arrakis as the Emperor, I found myself saying that’s it? 6/10, it was alright, but not as good as the first movie, which is an easy 10/10 for me.

Deadpool and Wolverine

This movie surprised me. It rushed me, took me by the throat and slapped me around. I was NOT expecting this to be any good. And yet… I loved it to death. I have summarily declined to watch any new Marvel movies past Endgame, even though I was persuaded to watch the third Guardians (which I enjoyed). My hopes were very nonexistent, so my surprise was immense. I loved the cameos; I loved the actual longer cameos! I loved Gambit, I loved Blade and for the first time in twenty-five years I actually loved Wolverine. I was never hyped by any of the older Xmen movies (except First Class, which was a great movie with a terrible ending). Wolverine felt nasty, vicious and dangerous. He was unruly and rude. He was fighting to kill, lunging with claws extended and going for the throat. He was exactly as he should have always been. And I did not mind Deadpool, as much as I did in the previous movie. This was a 10/10, easily. A legendary movie that I will be watching a lot in the future.

Mad Max: Furiosa

Despite the fact that I love the original Mad Max trilogy (yes, even Beyond Thunderdome) and am also a huge fan of Fury Road which I have seen a dozen times in the theatre when it came out, I did not like Furiosa. I felt the movie was too long without a point, there were questionable story design choices, the effects and CGI were terrible in a series that is known for practical effects and the worst of all, I cannot defend the use of AI in any entertainment format; whether that is a movie, a game or music. There is a point in the movie when Chris Hemsworth was sitting on the roof of his car and looked at the camera stating that he is bored and wants to go home. Never before has a movie expressed a sentiment that I agreed with so fundamentally. It spoke downright to my core and I am even more disappointed in myself that I stayed until the end hoping it gets better. It did not. Was there anything I liked? Sure, it was fun seeing Immortan Joe again even though Hugh has passed and was this time played by a different actor. His voice was modulated by an AI, which is shameful. Was Taylor-Joy good as Furiosa? Yes and no. She was good as a young Furiosa, but making her look like Charlize Theron once again with AI imaging? Nah, that is a pass for me. With how much Miller used AI in the production, I would not be surprised if he even asked ChatGPT or another LLM to write the script. 3/10 and I hope this was a blunder or a learning experience for someone, not an inspiration. There already is a Fury Road prequel, which is a comic book and it is very good. I will never understand why they decided against adapting that. I hear that comic book adaptations are all the rage now.

Alien: Romulus

After the titillating experience that have covered the Fassbender – Scott yaoi known as Prometheus and Covenant, I have also given up on Alien as a franchise. Truly, nothing has killed my interest in a franchise faster than watching Fassbender make out with himself. Ok, that is not true, I only need to look at the newest Star Wars media and that feeling of a ruined nostalgia is easily reminded. However, once again, I was persuaded to go and watch Alien: Romulus, and damn… It is interesting to see what passionate people that like something are able to create. Ultimately, there were only two things I did not like about Romulus: the fact that in order for the plot to move forward, there had to have been stupid people involved (a typical horror trope from the 90s) and also that essentially, the movie did not bring anything new to the mythos of Alien. Which considering the atrocities of Ridley Scott (and others), is a positive. 8/10 – really good and I want to see more from the director Alvarez and the creative team behind Alien: Romulus, please.

 

And that is it for the movies we have seen in theatres. It is not many, but then again, there have not been many that caught my eye. I need to make some honorable mentions as well. These are films that have not come out this year, but I have watched them for the first time in 2024. Robocop 1 and 2. And holy shit, what a fantastic treat the first Robocop was! I never knew it was made by Paul Verhoeven, who made my favorite scifi of all time, Starship Troopers. The second Robocop - I did not care for that much, though. My wife and I both really loved Leaving Las Vegas with Nick Cage. We also saw Lost Highway by David Lynch and initially I wanted to see this, because it has been cited as the inspiration for Silent Hill 2 – but I did not like it very much. It was alright, but I was not overwhelmed.

However, I need to mention the best movie I saw this year – better even than Deadpool and Wolverine.

This is Godzilla Minus One – what a movie! It is just perfect. The Japanese get it, they know how to make a fantastic monster universe movie. I love Godzilla and Kong and even though I have not seen the latest Universal movies, because I did not like the first crossover they did, I gave a chance to the Japanese one. Usually, when it comes to monster movies, it is the human element that is terribly boring and you only care about the monsters, but Godzilla Minus One does exactly what the American movies try to do with Millie Bobby Brown and Ken Watanabe, and Bryan Cranston. I really, really cared about the human story in Minus One. I wanted them to be happy and safe. And Godzilla was this force of nature, absolute colossus of destruction and death. If you have not seen it and you like monster movies, you need to see Godzilla Minus One, which is a legendary 10/10 movie for me.

 

Rapid Recollections – TV Shows

My wife and I have really saw only a couple TV Show from beginning to end this year. Most of them didn’t even come out in 2024, but I would still like to mention some of them.

The Terror

Absolutely stunning storytelling of the Franklin expedition into the Arctic when the brave sailors went looking for the northwest passage around the Northern American continent. What is there not to love? The atmosphere is dreary, melancholic and scary. There is the usual paranoia and loneliness. And in the darkness and snow lurks something much worse than primal human nature. Epic TV show that I recommend to anyone, if you are a fan of polar expeditions or a slow creeping horror, or you just want to see a gripping tale, the Terror has you covered. I loved this so much and finishing it has left me empty and sad inside, but at the same so grateful that I got to experience such a journey. 10/10 legendary TV Show.

The North Water 

As far as the setting and themes go, the North Water is very similar to the Terror, but it is a bit shorter and somewhat more brutal. It covers some of the last whaling expeditions into northern waters above the British Isles. There is also Colin Farrel playing an evil murdering hobo sailor. Imagine Harry Du Bois from Disco Elysium, but instead of depression you have a murderous rampage. It was alright. The final two episodes were a bit too fictitious for me, felt too fake. But it was still a solid watch. 7/10 – above average television.

  Shogun

I am a ravenous consumer and fan of the Sengoku period in medieval Japan, so when I heard about this TV show, I was excited like a little boy. It also has Hiroyuki Sanada in the titular role, who is one of my favorite actors. He is that coolest Japanese guy in every Western movie. But alas, I did not enjoy it. It was by the first five minutes when I realized that none of what is happening in the show actually reflects real events and history. I quickly came to find out that that this is an adaptation of a book by an Australian American writer James Clavell, who wrote his own fanfiction of the Sengoku period. Instead of writing about real historical events and characters like for example Henryk Sienkiewicz, Leo Tolstoy or the modern Bernard Cornwell (all amazing writers who crafted immersive historical novels), Clavell just sort of loosely based his book on the closing years of the Sengoku period and made up his own characters. And I could not have been more disappointed. The actors were great, the production values were beyond high value quality, it’s just the writing and the source material which left me wanting something better. I kind of refuse to rate the Shogun, because I have never heard of the source material so I cannot judge it based on its merits as an adaptation. As a fictitious and completely made up historical drama, it was alright. 

            I have also liked seasons one and three of the Boys and was reluctant to get back. I have watched the first three episodes of season 4 and kind of never got back into it. The episodes were long, drawn out and out of every 60 minutes or so, only 10 were interesting. I am not coming back.

    

            I also have to mention Dexter and Supernatural. We are currently watching these shows at home – my wife never saw Dexter and I never finished Supernatural, but we enjoy both and want to see more.

            Anyway, this has been my list for games, movies and TV shows that I have seen in 2024. What were you favorites among these from this year? Do you agree with some of my remarks or disagree? What was your most favorite game and movie? Let me know in the comments. In Part 2, I would like to continue with an overview of my cosplay activities; I will be covering the cons we have been to with my other half as well as some crafting that I have done.

Lords of the Fallen (2023) – Religion is bad, but also cool

 

Lords of the Fallen is what they call a Soulslike in the gaming industry – a videogame that is mimicking the Fromsoftware approach to action RPGs. These games have a reputation of being difficult and having an obscure story. I have played LotF when it came out last year and I did not have a good time. I also just finished a fresh playthrough. In this post I wish to compare my two experiences as well as give an overall view on the game itself. I have really enjoyed parts of the game, especially the aesthetic – the visual design as well as some of the mythos and characters. What I have not enjoyed however is certain aspects of the gameplay that I felt were just not good enough for a solid experience. While I have Lies of P to thank for finally teaching me how to parry, LotF really just made me want to play other games since there are three main issues with this game. The movement, enemy variety and weapon animations. It is not all bad, however as I certainly loved some other aspects.  

            Like I have already mentioned, LotF is a Soulslike. You will be running around and killing enemies for XP (it is called Vigor here), and if you die twice without retrieving it, you will lose that XP. You also use it purchase items and upgrade weapons. There are questlines with NPCs that are easily missed or ruined, if you do not follow a guide and/or do not know where to go and what to do when exactly. This is standard for Soulslikes and while I have never been much of a fan of this approach to storytelling, eventually I got used to it. This system is designed this way so that you have an incentive to play these games over and over again. Whenever I was not playing LotF, I have been thinking about playing it. Why? Because I love the ideas of this game.

            Lords of the Fallen takes place in a place called Mournstead, which is inspired by a late medieval European period with heavy influences of Abrahamic religions. Long ago, there was a God called Adyr who might have created humanity or at least led them into its golden age (not sure about this one). There were three human rebels who rose up against Adyr’s rule and who wanted humanity to be free of the god’s influence. They sealed Adyr in an alternate dimension and established a new world order and religion. The worship of Adyr was outlawed and its place was took over by the radiant religion of the holy god Orius. Not everyone liked this new order and some were still very fond of Adyr, they practiced their worship in secret and were persecuted for it. Adyr has been trying to break free of their prison for a long time now, he even created the Rhogar, a new race of demon-like entities who were supposed to destroy the church of Orius and help Adyr come back from his prison dimension. Some humans take on the appearance of the Rhogar – demonic horns, protruding bones and blood, lots of blood. What has been shown in great detail in the game is how even a sign of Adyr worship is punished – villages are burned, cities are razed, entire swathes of people are cut down and massacred. The church of Orius knows absolutely no mercy – this is where the religion is bad theme plays its strong hand. Now, I am not here to argue real world religion and politics or even describe them. Personally, I do not need a reminder of the atrocities that were committed in the real world due to religion, one needs to look at the crusades or medieval Europe and you have enough for countless horror stories. I felt like Lords of the Fallen strut a fine line between ridiculous and serious, though. I will make another comparison, this time to the good old game series by Blizzard - Diablo. Specifically, Diablo 2 also had strong emphasis on religion, on a war between angels and demons and how it was the poor people that were caught in between who were the real victims. While the two sides were both pretty bad. Lords of the Fallen falls into a similar category for me.

And I have to say that the visual themes are amazing here. Absolutely beautiful – and I do not mean in a “wow these graphics are so cool” way. While Unreal Engine 5 has a reputation of being unoptimized, it does make things look nice. What I mean is how great the visual storytelling is here. You will be walking through a burning city with various images of demonic worship and crucified citizens and corpses strewn across a street. There will be statues of angelic figures with weeping blood, there will mass graves, etc.

There will be soldiers and warrior of Orius who venerate their god of light by wrapping their hands in barb wire, bleeding themselves in masochistic fashion. One of the schools of magic actually uses exactly this – you channel holy magic by cutting yourself and bleeding. You will see blood flowing from your character whenever you fire a bolt of radiant energy. Various armaments of the church of Orius feature barbed wire extensively. Whether it is on boots, gloves or wrapped around the hilts of swords (instead of the blade). It is absolutely metal in its design and I love every aspect of it.

The music, what little there is in the hub and during some of the boss fights is also done exceptionally well. I never felt like it did not belong or was out of place. What was a shame however is that there is no music playing when you are exploring the world – just like in the Dark Souls trilogy, Bloodborne or other Soulslikes. In Elden Ring though there is ambient music when you explore and I wish we would see this more in these games in the future.

Where in terms of the story does the game begin, though? Well, Mournstead is mostly in ruins when you create your character. What has happened? The church of Orius is represented by the Hallowed Sentinels, which is a military branch of the church that is led by Judge Cleric and apparently, they have gone insane and started exterminating anyone even suspected of being corrupted by Adyr or Rhogar influence. Including innocent people, of course. Those citizens that have been spared the purges died or gone mad from a disease that ravaged the kingdom just before that. A young prodigy in the ranks of the Hallowed Sentinels, Pieta had a suspicion that the plague was spiritual in nature as some of the symptoms were similar to that of the Rhogar mutations. I mentioned that Mournstead is a kingdom, which means there is a king too, right? Of course, his name is Bramis and throughout various flashbacks (these are called stigmas in game) he is shown as being a typical strong but fair ruler who tolerates Judge Cleric – however when the catastrophe falls on Mournstead, he cannot intervene when it comes to the religious purges because he himself is consumed by a familial tragedy. His wife is a secret Adyr worshipper, I think out of necessity, who makes a deal with the devilish god to save their infant child. This of course goes horribly wrong and thus the ruling caste of the kingdom is crippled. As such the land is ravaged by a holy war between the militant arm of the church and the persecuted citizenry that has either turned to Adyr in their hopelessness or because of their nefarious reasons. As if this was not enough, there is another reality, another dimension that is layered on top of what everybody calls Axiom, the real world.

 

This other dimension is called Umbral – I am not entirely sure if it is just another reality or if it is the realm of death. It is called both in the game and the distinction has not been clear to me, not exactly anyway. So, what is Umbral? It is another realm which mirrors the real world and from a gameplay perspective you are transported into it once you “die”. Effectively, when you die in Dark Souls, you reload at the latest bonfire that you have rested at, not so in LotF. Instead, half of your HP is “withered” (which is another mechanic that is somewhat similar in function to the Bloodborne HP mechanic – you recover withered HP by attacking enemies without them hitting you). Umbral is a desolate place, everywhere are creepy eyes that follow you around, spiky tentacles and the sky is full of eldritch horrors. The enemies are these weird husks looking humanoid corpses that have gaping holes where their faces should be and they remind me a lot of Ash Vampires from Morrowind. There are also hooded spectres, pregnant spiky fairies with no jaws and lots of moths. Whenever the threshold between Axiom and Umbral is thin, there are moths. The main color palette is blue. Everything is blue. It is like Hotel Hell season 3 with sad Gordon Ramsey. Which I do not mind, I really love the design of Umbral. You as a player do not want to spend a lot of time in Umbral, because the more you are in it, the more the malignant inhabitants of that world notice you and eventually an enemy will spawn that hunts you and you cannot defeat it (or at least it is very difficult). You have to be in Umbral, however as most level progression is tied behind it with shortcuts, secret ladders, doors that are locked in the real world are opened in Umbral. So, you have to transition between worlds in order to move on and make progress.

There is another god, called the Putrid Mother that is like this awesome, incomprehensible Lovecraftian abomination that wants to devour all and is being very opportunistic regarding the situation around Adyr. The demonic god is trying to shatter the barrier back onto the real world and the Putrid Mother would like to hop along as well, and eat everything. It is truly horrifying – you would not want to live in any of the Dark Souls games, not in Yarnham from Bloodborne or the Lands Between from Elden Ring. The same can be said about Mournstead in Lords of the Fallen.

In any case, the game begins when a small troop of a preacher and his knights arrives in Mournstead from abroad to figure out what is going on. Everyone but the preacher is killed, he finds you and gives you the task to figure things out. He needs to know what happened to the Hallowed Sentinels, what is going with King Bramis, etc. And thus, your task begins.

I love the setup and I love the world. Despite the fact that I am not a fan of the whole religion is bad trope, this is right up my alley.

Let’s talk about the gameplay, which is… not great. Immediately I had this jarring issue with movement. There is a lot of rubber banding – which means that you keep getting stuck on things in the world that you should not be stuck on as well as hitting the walls that are there, as well as those that are not there. This is not the worst, however. No, that is the attack movement. Every time you swing a weapon, your character does an animation which moves him forward or to the side. Which is natural, right? When you attack, you move – even in reality you do not stand in one place. I mean, you can, but unless you are using a thrusting weapon or an overhead attack it is not ideal. In LotF however, you move too much. You ice skate. You swing a weapon and your character zooms forward like that player sprite on icy levels in Pokémon.

 This is infuriating and last year when the game came out, you could actually fall off ledges like this. There are many areas in the game where you are on a cliff or a bridge, or something similar and there are enemies everywhere. You attack an enemy near the ledge, your character ice skates around and falls to his doom. What a terrible design.

Now, to be fair, the developers have since fixed this and while you still ice skate around when attacking like crazy, you cannot fall to your death. Your character now stops near the ledge automatically.

The second major issue is the enemy variety. There are many areas in the game, however there is only one, fairly at the beginning that has unique enemies that are only there. It is a poisoned swamp, no less. Every other area in the game, whether you are in a forest, in some ruins, in a giant burning city, in a monastery or at the king’s castle, you face the same enemies. The only difference is in their stats/scaling. Basically, meaning in the first six hours of the game, you will have seen more than two quarters of what the game has to offer only because the later areas recycle bosses and turn them into mobs. What also makes me angry is the scaling - an enemy you can one shot in an earlier level, one shots you at a later level. And it is the same enemy! He looks the same, has the same attack animation, same weapon. It is incredibly annoying.

The third and final major issue in my opinion is the weapon variety. Not in terms of how many weapons there are. There are lots! Axes, flails, swords, bigger swords, massive swords. You have bows and crossbows. What is really disappointing is that every weapon group has the same animations and same attack patterns. So, the only difference is the stat scaling. Again, this is a major issue since what is the point of finding other weapons? There are also no special arts, moves or anything like that. They added something a kin to these in a patch later down the line, however you have to complete complicated and obtuse quest lines to even unlock them and then you can use these special moves twice, maybe three times, which makes them useless.

I hear the developers are working on a sequel and if they are, I hope that these three issues are addressed, because otherwise it will not be a fun experience.

You have an umbral lamp, which is another plot relevant item that allows you to peer into the horror infested realm and also allows you to travel there by will. As far as combat goes, you can use it to “soulflay” enemies which rips their souls out of their bodies that you can attack for some withered damage, but I rarely used this. In combat there are times, when you have to use the lamp. This is when there is a little floating blue ball that only exists in Umbral (and thus you cannot see it in the real world) that is attached to an enemy – you have to take out your lamp and suck this ball into your lamp, otherwise the enemy it has attached itself onto it is invincible (it has very fast HP recovery). This is super annoying and after forty hours of game, I resented this mechanic. This blue balled enemies will be strategically placed so they can screw you over and the process of taking out your lamp, starting the sucking animation and waiting for it to finish can be interrupted by other enemies. Which again, is not fun. If you want me to start sucking off blue balled enemies in the game, the least you can do is make it fun.

If I were to write about this game last year, when it came out, it would not have been positive at all. The game ran terribly, the performance was more horrifying than the realm of Umbral. Unplayable on the PS5 and on PC it varied. It was also crashing constantly. Furthermore, apart from technical issues there was a very distinct design philosophy that I heavily disliked. The game was unfair – it had that Dark Souls II philosophy, where there was an enemy behind every corner and near every ledge there was a mob ready to push you off to your death. There were exploding barrels, exploding dogs and archers spamming exploding bolts and arrows. When the game worked, which was not very often, it was torture to play. I finished it but I hated almost everything about it and did not want to come back, at all.

All was not terrible, however as the developers refused to give up on the game and for a year straight decided to patch it every week. First, there were many patches to address the technical issues. Eventually, additional things were added – like new spells, new armor sets, new bosses, new questlines. Things have improved. However, looking back at it now, the game felt like it was in beta for a year. Except, it was being sold for full price and the customers were the QA testers. Which did not do the reviews and especially Steam scores any favors. Score are one thing, however the longevity of a game is also determined by the size of its playerbase – especially if it has multiplayer and LotF does! I will express my opinion on the multiplayer aspect in a second. First impressions are absolutely everything and are very important! Whether these are for people you meet or the experiences you have in your life. And this was no different, of course. After the abysmal launch the game was in, the player base dropped significantly. 

The game has released on 13^th October 2023 and had 43 thousand concurrent players on Steam alone. In a month, the player count has fallen down to 4 thousand. Almost forty thousand players stopped playing the game in a month! This is insane.

I hear that Hexworks is working on a sequel, I am praying that they learn from their mistakes and delay the game if needed, so it does not come out in a state like this.

In any case, what else is there to talk about? Multiplayer? Yeah, the game boasted of having a seamless 1:1 coop where you could play the entire game with a buddy from start to finish – which was not true at launch. And still kind of is not true even to this day, even though the multiplayer connection issues have been mostly ironed out. How it works is that you have a player who has their own world that you yourself can connect to – and you can run around, kill bosses and mobs and also upgrade your character, but you cannot progress questlines. The multiplayer however has been enjoyable to me. I have liked it more than the usual Fromsoftware multiplayer where you need to do a million things as well as a dark ritual and wait for the celestial entities to be in proper alignment if you want to connect to anybody. What I mean by that is that it has always been needlessly complicated to initiate multiplayer in any Fromsoftware game.

I wanted to love Lords of the Fallen so very much. I kind of even do. I would not have finished three playthroughs over the last year if I were not fond of it. I have very high hopes for the sequel and I am hoping that Hexworks does not rush it. You only ever get one first impression. Would I have recommended the game last year? Absolutely not! Can I recommend it now? Yes, but with an asterisk. You need to be aware of some of the negatives up front as well as getting the feeling of the movement. Once you run around the initial area and kill a couple enemies, try the first real boss (not the tutorial boss) and you are ok with ice skating around, then definitely yes. The visual aesthetic as well as the lore of the world is amazing and easily a 10/10. It is bleak and yet vivid. The graphic violence on display is horrifying and yet it belongs. The stories of various NPCs and some of the more involved questlines are fantastic, some are heartfelt, some are scary, most are hopeless and sad in true Soulslike fashion. But the gameplay is lacking and some of the design ideas are not great. There are three very strong negatives I have outlined above and some minor as well. However, when this game is good, it is brilliant, certainly the highs are extremely high. When I put these all on a scale, it comes up as just average, however. When I compare these to other games in the genre, LotF does not compare very well. Competitors have done it better. Sure, Lies of P does not have a world that is as intriguing as this one and you cannot create your own character. But it has crisp gameplay that is unmatched by LotF. So, without turning this into another rant, I give Lords of the Fallen (2023) a 5/10 – an average experience. This is not terrible! This is not an IGN score, where everything below 8 is trash. An average game is just that. Despite everything, I liked my time with Lords of the Fallen. When Hexworks releases the sequel, I will be there, day one, having bought the game and playing it. I will be expecting a better launch than this one.

Please, tell me in the comments below to git gud or how you disagree on everything I have said. Or perhaps how you also had a similar experience while playing the game. How was your first impression with Lords of the Fallen? Did you enjoy it? Or do you hate it?