Recent reviews by Larendell

Ah, Max Payne – the original John Wick! After playing through Control (2019) a year ago, I decided it was time to take on an even more classic Remedy title from over two decades ago. Payne to the Max!

In a weird way, it was at the same time more inventive and intriguing then I expected, while also being a helluvalotta jankier and tougher then I could have imagined. Instead of a Serious Sam -esque shoot 'em up it felt more like a tactical shooter like Counter-Strike. One wrong move, and a stray bullet would finish you off; even on the easiest difficulty. Meanwhile some enemies wouldn't flinch after taking three sniper bullets straight to the ol' noggin'. Perhaps an asymmetric game of Counter-Strike would be more accurate?

After a while I almost started treating the experience as a puzzle game: jump out in slow motion, take out enemy A... a quick reload... count to three... jump out in slow motion and start pre-firing to the right as enemy B is about to show up... run back to avoid the grenade that always gets thrown by enemy C that would instantly kill you... and so on. Caught a stray bullet during an imperfect execution? Death and reload! I wouldn't be able to tell you what my high score on loads per minute was during my playthrough!

After finishing the game I accidentally stumbled upon the alleged fact that Max Payne has a dynamic difficulty that only goes down if you watch the death animation 'til the end, which would very much explain why occasionally combat felt tough as nails. Can't say I've really come across such a balancing system before, and here is perfect example why that is! The gunplay and bullet time was mostly fun though, and I was constantly stacked with more guns and ammo than I had time to shoot!

The story boils down to the usual one-man-army-betrayed-cop-gone-rogue who has lost everything and is taking everyone down with him – one gangster at a time! You probably know the drill. But I have to commend the comic book style that was present from start to finish in all cutscenes and the narrator's gloomy voice that sardonically described the unfolding events! The atmosphere and sound design was superb as well; I almost had to lift my headphones at one point to see if the dogs barking in the distance were in-game or outside! Ultimately, gameplay is king in this genre of action games, but the story was nonetheless neatly packaged and well presented.

Oh boy, oh boy was there some bumps in my road through the dark nooks of Noir York... It all started when I clicked on 'New Game', and was greeted with a silent cutscene. There was nothing to do but to quit and go search for a mod to fix the apparently very widespread sound issues. No biggie. Also grabbed a mod for better widescreen support while I was at it. Everything seemed to be back to as it should be. Except it wasn't – in many different ways, as I was slowly going to find out!

From the start I raised an eyebrow when I saw our protagonist make his barrel rolls that apparently went nowhere?! I shrugged it off, but after some time I started noticing other small quirks: I was sliding down stairs as if I was in a water park, and sometimes I got stuck in walls. Movements felt off and janky. Then came the dreamscape platforming sections, and my otherwise pleasant enough experience started seriously going downhill. As it turned out, my greatest opponent was not a gun wielding maniac, but physics...

I would constantly get stuck in walls, so I had to take great care to steer clear of them or I'd even be forced to just reload the game to get unstuck. Then, after extremely painfully completing a platforming maze, where a majority of the time I would be glued to the floor and thus falling to my death as I tried to jump over the gaping pit of doom, I finally cracked. I quit the game and looked for the cause of this madness. As it turned out, the well over two decades old engine didn't really hold up when faced with a thousand frames per second, and started going haywire.

After looking up a guide on Steam, downloading some hopefully not virus infested files, and successfully installing them, I finally booted up the game. It took a good while of fiddling, but Max Payne was finally bringing the pain instead of getting stuck and being lame! This was the part where I realised how much of the earlier jank was actually the result of this same glitch, and not intended gameplay features! I was already two thirds through the game, but I still wasn't enticed to start from scratch to get a smoother, glitchless experience. But at least the last third section of the game was buttery smooth, comparatively!

There's some other things I could still go on about, like the level design, Finnish Easter eggs, or the handsome face of Sam Lake, but you probably got the gist of the most impactful things by now – so let's round this off. As of writing this on January the 3rd 2025, there is allegedly a remake of the first and second Max Payne games in the works at the secret Remedy laboratory. Even if you're ready to mod your game and twiddle with the settings for a bit, you might still want to hold off and wait for the remake to be released for a hopefully far superior experience. There is indeed a coal encrusted diamond of a classic game to be found here, so I urge you to steer your gaze towards the (hopefully) enhanced version instead, unless you (too) are dead-set on experiencing a bit of gaming history in it's original form!


(If not modding the game at all, 4/10.)

Phew, this surely was one of the games I have ever played... To such a degree in fact, that it will gain the honor of receiving my first ever negative review.

Syberia is one of the games I played 15–20 years ago as a kid on the PS2. Neither my English skills nor my cognitive skills were honed enough back then to get further than the first chapter, so I wanted to see what this game was actually about. Without this nostalgic factor I probably wouldn't have ever tried it here on Steam – even though I got it for free during a promotional event a couple of years ago. Now, where to start...

Let's lift the cat onto the table: as one will very quickly notice after booting up a new game, everything is very clunky, janky and sluggish. Your character moves extremely slowly, unless you constantly double click everything to run to it; then you're just slow. It would have been a slight upgrade if you were always running instead of walking. You're also forced to sit through every single unskippable animation as Kate leisurely ascends stairs, opens doors and crosses bridges. Frankly, you'll get your fill of feeling like a louse in tar during the first five minutes of playing. Better get used to it – just a dozen more hours to go!

The worldbuilding is okayish, but the characters in it feel unconvincing and frankly unlikable. The voice actors also offer a very mediocre performance that doesn't really convey the intended message well. The attempts at humour mostly fall flat as well, unless you count laughing at the game instead of with it. Throughout the game, the characters' voices and the subtitles didn't match up at all, which is something you wouldn't even expect from smaller indie games today! I guess I should have played in French for a better and more cohesive experience, mais c'est la vie...

The pacing was a bit questionable as well, e.g. when you're suddenly smacked with a 34 page book that explains some of the backstory, which takes someone slow like me 15–30 minutes to read through. There were a bunch of very easy to miss, small, clickable objects, but that's just the majority of point-and-click adventure games in general, so in my mind it didn't feel like a particular Syberia-specific annoyance. The 2002 graphics didn't bother me other than when they exacerbated the problem of finding some finicky and grainy objects in low-contrast environments.

The puzzles were nothing special, but at least there weren't any completely outlandish moments of having to combine a pair of scissors with a bucket of milk, or something in similar vein. Though the number of times that the item you're searching for is frustratingly hidden in plain sight near the place you need to use it in, while you're in a location with a dozen unnecessary and unopenable locked doors spread around the area, was a bit too high. Needing to enter a location or use an item only after a certain event trigger, or needing to just know when you instantly have to backtrack from a room and talk to a character again to now suddenly get an item, was on a few occasions very exasperating. At least there weren't any game-breaking bugs other than the two occasions, where the game completely froze during the transition from a cutscene back to gameplay, and I had to Alt-F4 quit and restart.

Now, everything I've written so far could potentially be slightly alleviated by an interesting and epic story, but there aren't really any stakes, and everything that happens is so completely dull and mundane. There MIGHT be living mammoths on some island somewhere?! Oh my god! You're not really rooting for anyone and the character development just feels off, somehow. I would say that the plot is quite predictable, but there's not really a lot to predict here, as not much really even happens. But I gritted my teeth until I crossed the finish line, which felt far away for a relatively short game. So at least you're able to complete the game and there isn't any bad bugs – just intentionally bad and frustrating design.

"I expect nothing, and I'm still let down."

To start off, I have to say that It Takes Two was a super polished and of high quality, with extremely few notable flaws. I played the game with my brother, and neither of us had any knowledge about the game prior to starting it. Who you're playing with will obviously have a major impact on your experience with the game, so grab a trusty pardner and jump on in!

The gameplay is pretty casual and very forgiving: you only get thrown a tiny bit backwards if both of you perish at the same time – and even then it's a very teeny tiny setback. This does help in avoiding frustrating situations and greatly lessens the likelihood of stabbing or getting stabbed by your partner. Play it with your grandma, nephew or filthy casual partner; they should all be able to handle it.

The gameplay is also very varied from start to finish, which you can look at either as scrapping mechanics before you get used to them and before all of their potential is exhausted, or as a way of constantly trying out something fun and different. Personally, I really liked the continually changing gameplay elements, even if wouldn't have minded if some sections were a little longer. All in all, the pacing of the gameplay was good and there weren't really any dull moments.

The relaxed gameplay also effectively gave you a lot of freedom to roam and explore all of the areas at your own pace. I can only think of one place where we skipped an optional explorable area (Helltower) and accidentally went forward, which locked us out from completing it even though we could return to the place. I loved how It Takes Two handled achievements, as it very much promoted exploration instead of grinding. The only nasty surprise was that apparently you can't get any achievements if you're playing on a Friend's Pass copy of the game, so I ended up still buying my own copy after already playing ~55 % of the way towards the end. :D

The story was quite good and heartwarming (except for THAT one part...), with plenty of cut scenes and excellent voice acting. We clocked in at around 16 hours, and a total of 19 hours including the hunt for the last achievements that I had originally missed, which is a very decent length, especially if you got the game on sale. The various mini-games were mostly okay, and added a bit of flavour to the story as well – even though it felt like most of them consistently went 3-0 to one of the players.

I purchased a PS5-controller two months ago, and this was the first game that I played from start to finish with it after an almost 15 year long break from my previous stint with the PS2. The gameplay seemed to be pretty similar whether you're using a controller or mouse and keyboard. Both had some benefits, e.g. the occasionally required aiming wasn't as clunky with a mouse. Playing with a controller combined with some of the featured gameplay elements gave a strong nostalgic throwback to the good ol' Ratchet & Clank -series back on PS2.

Metal: Hellsinger – part fast-paced first-person shooter, part rhythm game. A truly novel experience for any metalhead gamer! Much like Serious Sam/Doom, except the music takes an even bigger role.

Not too long of a game, as it only took me 12 hours to get 100 % achievements. The main story is pretty short, but there are also fun challenges that add a bit of gameplay, a harder difficulty setting once you beat the story, and a roguelike (Hades-style) game mode that you unlock after beating the game. So there's a good amount of content for those who want to keep up their brütal boppin' after finishing the main content. Also, the achievements are of pretty ideal difficulty and don't take an eternity to grind, which I appreciate.

The world, all enemies and the cut scenes look very beautiful. The only things that noticeably tanked the performance of my poor PC were some goo-spitting, flying enemies in the Leviathan-mode. The aesthetics feature some heavy (metal) fan service in form of skulls, bones, fire and a bit more skulls. Just what you'd expect from a metal fueled Hell. The story is pretty average, but with good voice acting. The original soundtrack features some wonderful singers like Serj Tankian, making it truly stand out from others.

The gameplay was quite fluent and snappy; perfect for seasoned FPS players who don't suffer from beat deafness. Having to stay on-beat with your shots, dashes and reloads adds an interesting twist to just having a sharp aim and quick reflexes. Might be my own fault, but I figured out how to do the very handy long jump just after beating the game, which sucks as I didn't get to really use it, and getting some of the secrets without it was... painful. Aside from this, the only problem I had gameplaywise was staying on beat. "Skill issue!" one might argue, but also, I'm not the only person who has pointed out how unintuitive it sometimes feels to try hitting only quarter notes while listening to the melodies, riffs and the drum beat – especially as metal typically features lots of syncopation. But, it is what it is.

All in all, Metal: Hellsinger is a very cool, short (or a bit longer, if you wish) experience that is an easy recommend for any metal fan.

After following Phasmophobia's development and watching some gameplay videos since the start in 2020, and buying it two years later in 2022, I finally started my personal ghost hunting journey in the fall of 2024. :D

Phasmophobia is a very impressive experience considering its humble origins as a one-man project. Its instant success and role in shaping the whole genre is a bit of a Cinderella story.

Phasmophobia brings you the definitive, authentic Ghost Hunting™ experience that you've always craved. Bring a couple of buddies to share the spooks and to make it a bit more Scooby-Doo-esque. I was also a bit surprised about how well it worked solo – and how much more unsettling being alone in a silent house with a murderous ghost is.

The start was a bit rough, as you have to conduct the investigations with minimal gear and minimal knowledge of what's going on. Though to be frank, me and my pardner in crime did skip the tutorial (which I do recommend you partake in). After a dozen hours you slowly start to grasp how everything works and what some of the ghosts' different quirks are. Depending on the amount of mystique you want to maintain, the wiki can lift the veil a bit on some mechanics, potentially improving your efficiency and survival rate markedly.

After forty hours it feels like I've gained a bit of a grasp on ghost huntin' and have seen the majority of what Phasmophobia has to offer. Though I have yet to unlock most of the higher tier equipment, which I am looking forward to doing. The map pool is also of a decent size, with some maps being huge enough to really benefit from having some co-investigators.

I'm looking forward to seeing Phasmophobia develop and maybe eventually even leave early access(?!). But in its current state it is already a solid, spooky, fun and innovative co-op gaming experience.


Update: Finally got all achievements after 210 hours! The game now occasionally feels even too easy, since I'm so familiar with all the ghosts after hours and hours of doing no-evidence runs – but surprisingly I'm still very excited to hunt some more ghosts! Truly a testament to how good the game actually is.

I also can't wait for the upcoming media evidence and player character -updates! After a couple hundred hours of playing, they feel like exactly what is needed to elevate the huntin' experience to an outstanding level! I thought about increasing my rating of 8,5/10, but I'll wait for the developers to polish the admittedly still very clunky animations etc. in the coming updates before I can fully do it with a good conscience!

Anywho: you know what it is. You sussy baka. The definite cult classic and top notch cultural influencer of the roaring (20)20's.

I tested it out for a few hours in 2020 and returned once more in 2024 too see what the state of the game was, and to get some of the new achievements. Needless to say, I put some 35 hours more into the game in a couple of weeks and ended up getting 30/33 'chievos, so it's still going strong!

I only played solo by joining public lobbies, which to be honest, were a bit hit-or-miss. Some pretty great, though occasionally you get a bunch of people who leave at the start of the game, some who disconnect, and the odd hacker every blue moon. But still, plenty of interesting social intrigue to be had. Unless you happen to run into some screeching eight-year-olds who can't read the rules posted in the chat. I.e. totally playable solo, but also worth it to experience a full lobby of friends who are together on Discord – if you have friends. Or join an Among Us -Discord.

So sharpen your tongue (and your pocket knife), crewmate, and finish your tasks!

I had my eyes on this game for five years, up until Nomada Studios released their new similar game NEVA, and had a big discount on GRIS. It is a shorter gaming experience, so might be worth it to wait for a sale – but nevertheless a very worthy purchase.

As every other review will have you know, the visuals and art style of GRIS are very distinctive. From an artistic point of view, this game is quite a masterpiece! Even though the story is quite up to interpretation – as if you were looking at a pretty painting. The general theme of the game is quite somber and touching, yet beautiful and uplifting. The music fits the visual style perfectly.

The gameplay was relaxed and pretty much what you would expect from a so-called a 'cozy game'. Though there are a couple of more intense scenes, there's no way for you to die in any part of the game. Most of the game consists of platforming with some occasional light puzzle solving.

Even though I'm generally quite slow in all my playthroughs, finishing my flower sniffing run of GRIS took a mere 4,5 hours, so it's well suited for a one evening experience. Afterwards it took me 3 hours to get the rest of the achievements and check out all the things that I had missed. I very much recommend playing through the game the first time without looking up anything beforehand or worrying about missing achievements! There's a solid checkpoint system in place that allows you to return later and get anything you might have overlooked. Lean back, relax and enjoy the beautiful experience!

Over a quinquennium ago my brother bought Divinity: Original Sin 2, which came with an extra copy that he kindly gave to me. Yes, it's still sitting in the "Next up" -section of my library, but I'll get to it... Soon™. He did play through it though, and it looked very intriguing and fun.

Fast forward to 2024 and Larian Studios has made quite a name for themselves and become a powerhouse of the gaming sphere with Baldur's Gate 3. During a big sale of theirs I happened to lay my eyes on the first Original Sin game, and read a few reviews that applauded it's co-op system, which was apparently in some ways even more intricate than in the very well received second installment. My interest was very much piqued, and so I gave a small *nudge nudge wink wink* to my bro, who got us the two-pack.

There was of course the the ever-present danger of it too ending up gathering dust in the far reaches of the library, but then I thought nay – this time we'll drop everything else and jump right into it! It had been a good while since either of us had experienced a good co-op game. And so, the following morning, we began our journey into Rivellon.

Our journey began, as we butchered a pair of guards in the name of righteousness! The rogue and the battle mage, venturing forth with neither guides nor googling as their advantage, relying completely on their wits (and brawn)! On normal difficulty there were only a few hickups in the early and middle game, while towards the end it felt a bit too easy. Even in the case that you're not used to it, I wholeheartedly recommend going at it without looking anything up beforehand and keeping the loading to a minimum.

We really loved the oftentimes whimsical humour of Larian that was injected into characters, quests, encounters and straight into the DNA of the game. Sometimes almost tipping to the side of strange, but also successfully keeping the experience very engaging and jovial until the end. The splendid voice actors also played a big part in setting the atmosphere and mood of the game. We the players were give a lot of freedom in how to approach encounters and solve problems. Physics also play a much more pivotal role than in any classic isometric CRPGs – both outside and during combat. The first part of the game was also a bit more combat heavy, while the latter part had a big amount of puzzles. Most of them fun, but a few puzzles really tugged at our brains a bit too much, and in some rather unintuitive ways.

Character development was at first a bit overwhelming with a big list of talents to choose from and no idea what to prioritize, while towards the end of the game there was almost a lack of appealing choices. My battle mage damage dealer-caster-healer-tank was a bit too spread out at first, but worked really well in the end game – though it was fun to play from start to finish. Inventory management and other RPG elements were pretty standard and worked as you'd expect them to.

The story was in no way, in my opinion, the highlight of the game, but it was decent enough. The real shine of the game comes from having a co-op partner to explore and experience the world, puzzles and characters with. While the rock-paper-scissors method for diplomacy wasn't to my liking when dealing with NPCs, it made arguing with your adventuring partner during dual dialogues more interesting, and worked better than just having a skill check. Also being able to split the party in many places and explore by yourself gave it a huge tabletop vibe.

Assassin's Creed first piqued my interest around 15 years ago, but it required some esoteric Internet platform called "Steam", so I never ended up dipping my toes into the franchise. Fast-forward a little over a decade, and I heard that some games were being delisted or having their support ended on the now a bit more familiar Steam-application, which expedited my purchase of the first two games in the series when there was big ongoing discount. Still, they lay there in my library for an additional year or two, before I needed some interesting action game that wasn't all too long to round out my summer.

To start on a positive note, I have to say that the graphics were much more pleasant than what I had feared! I was thinking about getting some graphic enhancements before starting the game, but apparently the mod support is non-existent – though while playing I didn't feel that I would have needed any upgrades, anyway.

The story, while quite predictable, was good enough. The meta-story felt a tad more engaging with more interesting characters than the main gameplay. While not a big deal, it was a bit of an unpleasant surprise when the story hit a wall and ended in a major cliffhanger, without much of a conclusion.

And now, regarding my less positive experiences with this title... Right off the bat – before even getting to the main menu – the whole game started freezing for seconds at a time every minute. Apparently, this is the game trying to connect to outdated Ubisoft-servers, which is easily fixable, but not a promising start! Other than this and a crash every ten hours or so, I didn't experience any technical hurdles.

The gameplay – the meat and bones, – was functioning as intended, but cannot be described without using the word clunky. And repetitive. Sometimes even frustrating. And did I mention repetitive? After doing the first mission you're basically up to speed on what you'll be doing the rest of the game. The three different main maps of the game are also similar enough to not have much difference neither gameplaywise nor aesthetically. The controls were set up in a cool and innovative way that I haven't encountered before, with one button controlling whether your action is low profile or high profile, e.g. a gentle push or a shove. But when push comes to shove and you're running for your life, you'll be jumping towards the wrong ledge or falling off the roof – all thanks to the inherently clunky controls. While quite unrealistic, being able to climb everywhere positively contributed to the gameplay experience and made the sacrifice of realism acceptable. Without spoiling anything, I'll just say that the ending sequences of the game were a sudden change of pace into an extremely combat-heavy style of gameplay that made the ending feel convoluted more than storywise.

A quality-of-life aspect that bothered me was the lack of subtitles. As a fairly language proficient non-native English speaker, I would still have appreciated not having to turn my sound up 50 per-cent every time I needed to hear some important story-related conversation. Also, making quitting the game take a minute and a half because you're forced to go through every single menu is frankly speaking atrocious.

I ended the game feeling that if I wanted some more reactive and multifaceted action combat, I would just go back to playing Ubisoft's Prince of Persia -trilogy. If I wanted to skulk in the shadows, I could get my fix from the classic Thief -trilogy. If I just wanted a better assassination-action-stealth-game with smoother movement, varying missions and a modern feel, I'd simply (re)play Dishonored.

All in all, the first entry in the Assassin's Creed series turned out to be an interesting experience that didn't overstay it's welcome – though it did feel a bit bland against 2024 standards. At least I didn't have to grind any Steam achievements since there were none. :P

I haven't played roguelike (almost bullet hell -esque) games much at all before, but I decided to give it a go after hearing multiple people recommend it. I went in totally blind – the only thing I had seen of the game was a few screenshots on the Steam store page.

The start was – as one could expect – quite brutal indeed! I died and died again and again. But I was instantly hooked and enjoying my Groundhog Day misadventures! It took me a total of 27 escape attempts and around 40 hours in total before my first successful crossing of the finish line. Though certainly victory felt that much sweeter after struggles comparable to Dark Souls!

Everyone's journey through Hades will be quite different, but if you go in blind and enjoy the beginning, it will only get better as you progress further, unlocking new mechanics and slowly progressing the story. While the gameplay was very, very much different, the general vibe of the game strongly reminded me of Inscryption – the card battles being replaced by swordplay.

To avoid spoiling anything, I will just say that the story is decent enough and balances out the combat-heavy gameplay very nicely. Decorating your home was a bit of an unexpected feature but admittedly it was one way of ensuring a constant feeling of incremental progress, even in the case that you keep dying for hours before eventually succeeding. It was also a nice way of spending resources without instant excessive power creep or introducing an overabundance of mechanics.

The Steam achievements were well thought out, as the majority of them were tied to either completing in-game challenges or progressing the story. Though in the end I wouldn't have minded if there were a handful more of niche achievements that required you to do some unusual runs for example under certain restrictions or utilising some less used mechanics. It was also extremely rare to get all achievements before even going through all of the (minor?) side objectives.

One last mention has to be made of the soundtrack and general atmosphere throughout the underworld. The sound design was excellent and I wouldn't mind listening to the soundtrack again even after doing a hundred escape attempts. The artwork also did much heavy-lifting in cementing Hades' unique and recognizable appearance.

All in all, Hades was a very memorable, satisfying and fun experience that I might return to again later, even after completing nearly everything that the game has to offer. If nothing else, then to purchase the last pair of missing alternate decorations for the House of Hades!